


I Think I Might Love You

by IronicAppreciation



Category: Stranger Things (TV 2016)
Genre: Angst, Dear lord a lot of it, F/M, I don't see enough decent Stoncy fics, I'm not sure exactly what this is, I'm trying I swear, Imma be real honest, M/M, Multi, Polyamory, it deserves more, melodramatic teens being melodramatic, this is the first poly ship i've ever shipped yall
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-01-25
Updated: 2018-12-16
Packaged: 2019-03-09 03:51:22
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 8
Words: 23,631
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13473111
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/IronicAppreciation/pseuds/IronicAppreciation
Summary: It starts, the way most things in Hawkins seem to start nowadays, with Will Byers.





	1. I Think Maybe God Hates Me

**Author's Note:**

> This first chapter is essentially just pining because I haven't seen my girlfriend in way too long and I'm fuckin projecting I'm so sorry

It starts, the way most things in Hawkins seem to start nowadays, with Will Byers.

Will Byers, who, God help him, at the age of fifteen, discovers rather unceremoniously that he doesn’t actually _mind_ the fact that the girls at school generally want nothing to do with him (unlike Dustin, who mopes about his misfortune with women at any and every given opportunity). Quite frankly, Will doesn't want anything to do with _them,_ either. His postpubescent female classmates with their suddenly more definably feminine figures (see: tits and curves) can stay a comfortable distance away, _thank you very much_. They don't want to be around him, and _he_ doesn't want to touch them with a forty foot long pole. It's not _just_ that he’s not interested; he quite adamantly wants jack shit to do with that fiasco, and if keeping girls the _fuck_ out of his vicinity is the best way to avoid all the drama he’s been so vigilantly warned about, then so be it.

(Although, if he’s being totally honest with himself, which he _really_ despises doing, his disinterest in his female counterparts isn't exactly a pursuit of voluntary evasion. He’s pretty sure he couldn't bring himself to care about girls, even if he tried.

And, god fucking _damn,_ has he tried.

And thinking about _that_ is scary enough as is, so he does his best to plow the very idea of it under some indiscriminate part of his mind and obscure it with as much shit as he possibly can. After all, the best way to get rid of your problems is, clearly, to ignore them with all your might and pray to _God_ that they get bored eventually and decide to leave you alone. Right?)

It doesn't help when, all of a sudden, with no fucking warning or premonition regarding its imminent reign of terror, Mike Wheeler’s smile--the same one Will’s known since he was five--starts enacting a troubling number on his stomach that feels less like flittering butterflies and more like stampeding elephants.

As the days wear into months and the kids’ first year at Hawkins High draws to a close, and the little Mike Things that Mike’s always done for as long as he can remember start affecting Will in atrociously embarrassing ways they’ve never done before, he knows definitively that he is royally screwed.

Because boys aren't supposed to get that giddy, fluttery rush of warmth and exhilaration creeping up their necks when other boys wrap their arms around them. They're not supposed to see other boys’ wide-mouthed grins and wonder idly what it would feel like to kiss the smiles falling over their lips. They're not supposed to find themselves woefully entranced by freckles or hair or the stupid color of their stupid eyes, or the way they pick at their scabs or scratch at the backs of their necks or cock their heads to the side when they're confused or worried. They're not supposed to want to nuzzle against other boys’ bony bodies for warmth or solace, they're not supposed to go red whenever their fingers or hands accidentally brush, they're not supposed to daydream about the dazzling, awestruck looks on their faces when you do something that makes them happy.

Boys aren't supposed to do any of that, and they _sure as_ _hell_ aren’t supposed to develop fucking _crushes_ on their best fucking friends.

But Will, because his brain doesn't seem to _care_ about what logic and reality dictate, has gone and done all of that shit anyway, and now, here he is, on the last day of his freshman year, with the gang, pretending that Mike’s gangling arms draped over his shoulders and his chin resting snugly on the top of his head--jawline nestled in the soft locks of his hair so that he can physically _feel_ the dorky-ass smile etched upon his friend’s face--aren't inducing a major malfunctional crisis that is fighting viciously for control over his entire goddamn body at this very second.

He's so so so so _so_ screwed.

(And the worst part is: he can't tell anyone about it. Not a fucking soul. He can't very well go up to anybody he knows and trusts and confide in them that, _‘hey, you know those asshats in middle school who called me a fucking fairy all my life? Yeah, they might've been right!’_ He just can't do that. He can't _talk_ to anybody--not even the people who’ve genuinely been there for him through _everything._ Not the Party, because all its members can see through him like translucent film paper, and they're all fairly well acquainted with _Mike,_ who he’d rather not lose over some facetious crush. Not his mom, because what kind of parent wants to know her kid is a fucking faggot? Even if she _was,_  for whatever reason, supportive and scornless regarding the fact--which Will doesn't doubt for a second that Joyce would be, should something ever possess him to burden her with the information--the social taboo and inherent _ickiness_ of it all would reflect poorly on her. And Will couldn’t do that to his mom. Not after _everything_ she’s gone through because of him. Not Jonathan, because Jonathan’s got a sufficient surplus of reasons to resent his kid brother already, and that he hasn't yet put them into effect is astounding enough as is. Will’s not gonna look that gift horse in the mouth, and he sure as _hell_ isn’t going to risk it.)

So, Will keeps quiet. He doesn’t utter a word, and he lets Mike hold his hand in the hallways, and rest his head against his shoulder, and duck into his neck or clutch at his shirt when he’s laughing too hard to keep to himself. He lets him convey that he's got absolutely no remote understanding of personal space whatsoever, and he pretends that his skin doesn’t fucking _burn_ wherever his friend touches him, and that his heart isn’t racing a mile a minute, throbbing perilously in his throat, threatening to _spill out of his lips_ whenever he hears the familiar greeting of _“Byers!"_ called out with a sort of fleshy enthusiasm he's never felt when _he_ was thinking about himself.

(He hates how he occasionally wishes Mike wasn't such a damn good friend to him.)

Some days, it’s tolerable. Some days, he can just bask in the light that resonates from Mike’s laugh or manifests in his fingers curled around Will’s own, and he can smile and nod and appreciate how damn lucky he is to call this boy his friend.

Other days, he wants so badly to bury himself in Mike’s horrible, itchy sweaters and curl his hands in his messy, unabiding hair and breathe him in as a proxy for oxygen (because Mike Wheeler is, has been, and always will be _so much fucking better_ than fresh air) and just fucking _drown_ in him until nothing else remains, it makes him weak at the knees and muddies his senses.

He finds himself able to suddenly sympathize vastly with Dustin’s implacable pining for their group’s newest member a year or so ago, even though Max had fallen, just like all the other girls, under his own guise as a whopping helping of _‘no thanks’_. He recognizes now the longing staring, the babbling and the nervous fidgeting, the undefinable quality of adoration expressed with every fleeting glance; he can see it all reflected in himself, and he _hates_ it.

(There’s a difference, though. Well--there’s quite a _few_ differences, but there’s one that seems to stand out in particular: the Resentment. Or, in his case, the lack thereof. The way Dustin’s giddy, happy eyes would go cold and callous in seconds whenever they landed on Max’s fingers conspicuously intertwined with Lucas’s. The way he couldn’t even stand to _see_ them together, although they were often simply standing beside one another, doing nothing inherently couply or distinguishable. The way jealousy seemed to seep from his every pore, like a wounded but stubborn animal refusing help but clinging pervasively to life by its ferocious, feeble talons.)

Will supposes he _should_ be jealous of El. Maybe it’s the fact that he knows good and well that he could never take her place that prevents him from hating her (Dustin had, at least, stood a chance). Maybe it’s the fact that she’s saved his life, _twice,_ and is just so damn unhatable.

But Will suspects in his heart of hearts, though being trampled _alive_ by a herd of rhinoceroses couldn’t draw the confession out of him, that the real reason he can’t bring himself to hold an ounce of resentment against her is the glaring, blatant happiness she’s brought to Mike’s previously bland and blasé life.

I mean, _god,_ have you seen the smile on his face when she’s anywhere near him? That thing could straightup _blind_ someone stupid enough to look directly at it.

His constant blathering about her. His incessant admiration. His plain awestruck exaltation. It doesn’t bother Will as much as it probably ought to, because the guy’s just so fucking _thrilled_ over her, so filled to the brim with unbridled glee, and Will absolutely _adores_ seeing Mike happy.

(He still remembers the one time he made him cry. Made him honest to god break down and couldn’t do a damn thing about it. He made a vow, at that very moment, to every god he’d ever learned of in middle school world history, that he’d never ever _ever_ make him hurt like that again. Not if it fucking _killed_ him.)

No matter what or who facilitated that glee--even if it couldn't be _him_ who brought that tangible joy to Mike Wheeler’s face--Will would never not be oh-so grateful that he at least got to be there to witness the radiation of exuberance shining off the honest-to-god masterpiece of a boy’s full-bodied smile.

It’s sometime after the Thanksgiving of ‘86 that Will sits up ramrod straight in his bed--eyes blown wide, a pencil still clutched in his clammy hand and his bio notebook open to a page of _highly irrelevant-to-biology sketches_ \--and forgets how to breathe.

The clock reads 3:43 a.m. when he realizes that _Shit._

_That’s not how crushes work._

It hits him like a speeding pickup and a headfirst dive into rushing traffic and a bullet made of ice plummeting straight through his heart all at once. It’s a shower of frozen needles attacking him in angry pinpricks, it’s a blow to the gut with a lead fucking pipe, it’s the simultaneous splitting _crack_ of every bone in his body breaking at the same goddamn time.

(He freezes. It’s cold. God, how he _hates_ the cold.)

By 3:44 in the morning on November 30, 1986, Will Byers, body marred with goosebumps and broken breaths held unwittingly hostage behind his lips, back against his mattress and hands wrenched in his hair, tugging against his scalp, pulling _viciously_ as if he might somehow be able to make the impossible untrue if he only manages to tear every last strand of hair off his head, realizes in a cold sweat that he’s _In Love_ with Mike Fucking Wheeler.

Unsurprisingly, Will doesn’t sleep all too well that night.

 

|~~~|

 

It's fairly common knowledge to just about everyone in the entire, godforsaken town that Steve Harrington had, in the past year, had his heart broken by Nancy Wheeler, and has _still_ yet to get over it.

( _'_ _Get over it.'_ Christ, he fucking _hates_ that phrase. As if an ingrown emptiness and gouged-out chasm where hope had once resided is something you can  _"_ _get over"_. As if love in it's messiest, most unapologetic form is something that just melts away if you try hard enough, and give it time. I mean, _fuck,_ what does this town even _know_ about love? It's about a half-step above arranged marriage, and a fucking five hundred foot drop below the concept of _needing someone so badly,_ you're willing to live with the pain of never ever having them. It's a society of middle-aged highschool sweethearts who were never all that heartfelt to begin with. It's a narrow minded mess of catacombs traipsed and tainted with _you gotta_ ’s and _you probably ought not to_ ’s. It's rules and limitations and restrictions all put together to concoct some hideous amalgamation of regulated law: the metastasized repetition of an infection from which the city has never quite recovered, but still prudently refuses to kill.)

...

Okay. So perhaps he's being a little dramatic. Maybe, just _maybe,_ he's only some guy who really misses his girlfriend.

(If you ask him, though, he’ll tell you point blank that the past two years have been proof enough to him that not only is there a waking world outside of Hawkins, but there's a world _outside_ the world outside of Hawkins.

And in a world so big, with so much _shit_ going on inside of it, all at once, Steve’s not about to waste his precious time _"_ _getting over"_ things.)

No, Steve Harrington isn't getting over _shit._

He’s _getting_ what he damn well knows he needs.

(What he _doesn't_ know, at least for now, is that what he _needs_ is a confrontation from a panicky, barely pubescent teenaged boy to get him to _wake the fuck up._ )


	2. I Think She's Hurting, But I Don't Know What's Hurting Her

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> She sees it, sees it bright and bold and blatantly blinding, in the way Mike talks about his friends.
> 
> And the way he talks about his Will.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Unrequited Love? One-Sided Pining? Sorry, I don't know her.

Jane Ives was twelve years old when she stepped off the property of the Hawkins Laboratory for the first time. She was twelve when her feet, bare and fresh and imminently laden with innumerable cuts and sores, first touched public Indiana soil.

A bit over a year later, at age thirteen, she became a legitimate citizen of the state itself. Now, she was Jane Hopper; not 011 or El or any variation of some indiscriminate number. _Jane._ Jane with a dad and with friends. Jane who lived a normal, happy life.

Now, she was _real._

(She remembers the first time Chief showed her the birth certificate. She recalls, with a twinge of embarrassment, how she had been unable to produce articulate phrases describing how ardently that thin sheet of paper had impacted her, so she had instead just whispered the words _"_ _Jane Hopper”_ under her breath, testing out the syllables, sampling how the name tasted until her mouth went numb.

 _Sweet_. She would later decide, after her first day at a public school with real teachers and real kids, on which her name was called out at least once each class period, during roll. _It tasted sweet, like syrup--_ another innovation of humanity to which she was blissfully introduced that very same year.)

Being Jane was good. Being Jane made her feel _alive._

But she still let them call her El. She would always be their El.

(Being their El made her feel good, too. It _also_ made her feel alive.)

On her fourteenth birthday, however, she was for the first time called something entirely different from anything else she’d ever been called in her whole life. Different from _Girl,_ which was what the Bad Men would call her when she’d done something wrong. Different from _Ellie,_ which was what Pa-- _Doctor Brenner_ would call her when she’d done something right. Different from Jane and El and Eleven, different from Freak and Liar and Weirdo.

In fact, she wasn't even sure that what she was called was a real _name._

Because on her fourteenth birthday, Lucas referred to her as _“Mike’s girlfriend” ._

(This had made Mike flush a bright, tomato red: a color El had never _known_ that the human complexion could mimic. It had made Dustin laugh and Max roll her eyes and Will shoot her a soft, kind smile, which, although reassuring, did nothing to assuage Jane’s confusion.)

She was fourteen years old when she learned what the word _“girlfriend”_ meant.

She was fourteen years and one day old when she walked to Mike’s house and informed him with a heavy heart that she couldn't be his.

(Mike had responded to this almost frantically, with a sort of meager desperation in his tone, telling her _no, El, you've got no reason to be sorry._ He told her that Lucas was _just joking_ and that he didn't honestly think of her _that way_ and that he would _never ever force her into a position like that, ever._ )

Now, at age fifteen, El knows with an utmost certainty that she loves Mike Wheeler with all her heart. She knows, with two years of experience as a real live human being under her wing, that she loves him, that she will never _not_ love him, that she'd do _anything_ for him.

But she's not _in love_ with him.

And Jane Hopper, at fifteen years old, with her curly, unruly dark hair that falls in a mop almost down to her shoulders, and her wide, large eyes and big hands and feet, knows the difference between _Love_ and _In Love_ almost immaculately.

(She sees it, every day. In the discernible contrast between the way Jim looks at her and the way he looks at Joyce. Between the way Lucas talks to Dustin or Will or Mike and the way he talks to Max. Between the way Steve gazes at his Kids and the way he gazes at Nancy.

She sees it everywhere.

And, though she’d never _ever_ say it out loud--because if there’s one thing El knows without a semblance of doubt, it's how to keep her mouth shut--she sees it, sees it bright and bold and blatantly blinding, in the way Mike talks about his friends.

And the way he talks about his Will.)

 

|~~~|

 

Nancy Jean Wheeler, from the moment she was born (5 pounds and 7 ounces of healthy, happy, beautiful baby girl), was Hawkins’ very own poster child for perfection in its most unsullied temperament. She was softspoken and pretty, she received good grades, and her transition from adorable little girl to stunning young lady was almost _damnably_ seamless.

And then, in 1984, she lost her best friend to an unfortunate accident involving the city’s water supply and chemical exposure, and she transformed overnight into the town’s personal pity case.

Incidentally, this was also the year that resident _Goody Two-Shoes_ , _Well-Acclaimed Teacher’s Pet_ , and _Certified Snob_ Nancy Wheeler became _Remarkable Sharpshooter_ , _Dedicated One-Man Rescue Team_ , and _Stubborn Bitch_ Nancy Wheeler, almost overnight.

(This is not to say that she was not still the Very Same Nancy the town so surely knew and loved; all in all, she maintained her picture perfect persona, even after _everything,_ to a T. She was still softspoken, she was still pretty, and she still received good grades.

But now, she was a force to be reckoned with, too. A hurricane, the first thunderclap of an unending rainstorm, a punch to the face with the cold hard truth--or, God forbid, if you _really_ managed to set her off, a blow to the gut with an immaculately aimed bullet.)

It was that damned dreadful year that altered her into a person who could stab a burning fire poker into her kid brother’s best friend’s ribs because the situation called for quick, dire thinking, and she had the guts to do what others would not. It was that awful, irrevocable year that drove her to lying and lying and _lying_ to anyone and everyone she'd ever cared for in order to pursue a greater truth.

It was that terrible, wonderful year that she fell in love with Jonathan Byers.

Without ever falling _out_ of love with Steve Harrington.

(But, at the same time, she was still Hawkins’ poster child for perfection in both theory and practicality. She was still softspoken, but she was feisty. She was still pretty, but she was harrowed. She still received good grades, but she was hardened.

She was still Nancy Wheeler, but she was _changed._ )

She was in love with two guys at once.

And, for the love of God, no one could ever know.

 

|~~~|

 

Max decided that winter in Indiana was the absolute _worst_ when she first arrived to a shoddy, dank December night in a little town called Hawkins.

The first snowfall of the year had held her captive in her own home, a hostage to the disaster she called kin--alone, alone, so _unspeakably_ alone--while her parents were off at work, and she was stuck with the monster she called her brother.

( _Step_ brother.)

It didn’t snow back home. It was never so cold, and dark, and lonely. She never had to jerk herself awake the moment she felt herself dozing off for fear that sleep was too _great_ a vulnerability, too _obvious_ a weakness, to leave exposed. She was never _prey,_ never a prisoner in a house she couldn’t for the _life_ of her begin to consider a _“home”_ , no matter how adamantly her mom referred to it as such.

She missed California. She missed her dad.

(And _then,_ she met Will Byers.

Will Byers, who was five feet and two inches of adorkable, sweet, and wonderfully weird.

Will Byers, who was five feet and _three_ inches of broken, irreparable, and indiscernibly lost.

Will Byers, who was a whole goddamn _five and a half feet_ of _holy shit, this kid is kind of incredible._

He, too, had lived for years with a manipulative, hateful, violent _asshole_ his mom claimed to love even when he hurt her without a shred of reluctant remorse.

He, too, had learned to cover bruises and cuts with things less conspicuous than puffy bandages that raised too many questions.

He, too, absolutely _detested_ the cold.

And Max _loved_ him, instantly.)

She remembers quite clearly the day back in the December of 1985, when Mike was introducing El to _snow,_ and El, for his sake, was pretending she hadn’t already _lived_ _in_ the snow for nearly seven straight months, hypothermic and half-dead when a certain _Police Deputy_ gathered her up and hauled her home. She remembers Dustin and Lucas, tuckered out from a snowball fight that had lasted all of two vicious minutes, laying in the silver-white banks, making the _laziest_ snow angels Max had ever seen. She remembers flurries of hair caught in tremulous wind, and scarves and coats and earmuffs and beanies bundled tightly around tawdry bodies.

She remembers standing there, _shivering,_ when Will Byers walked up to her and asked if she maybe wanted to head inside for a cup of hot cocoa.

Max smiled-- _beamed,_ actually--and told him she’d love nothing more.

(That was the night that he _himself_ had recounted to her what exactly had happened that week in the previous year, when he’d been “lost in the woods.” It was a different experience altogether from when the others had told her the story; It was harder to hear. It was realer. It was _scarier._ It made her want more than anything to wound her arms tightly around all 90-some pounds of the kid in front of her, swaddled in his sweaters and his jackets and his even  _more_ jackets, just to be safe, and squeeze him until the faded, distant gaze in his eyes was forced out of his body; it didn’t _fucking_ belong there.)

 _He’s so small,_ she had realized that day. _So much smaller than the others. Smaller_ _than a boy his age probably ought to be._

(But Max knew--she didn’t know exactly _how_ she knew, but she _knew_ \--that he was stronger than anyone had ever given him credit for, in more ways than one. At surface value, she doubted even the hardiest, burliest of men could survive a _day_ of what he’d endured for two separate weeks in two separate years. Deeper, however--and this was the part she didn't  _quite_ understand, just knew that she knew--she also believed that no one, no one in the _whole goddamn world,_ could survive a day of just his regular, altogether unremarkable life. _Hell,_ she herself had been through a whole awful lot in her indefinite fourteen years, and even _she_ felt like she’d drown in an _instant_ were their positions switched, at this very moment.)

And now, now that it’s been almost another _year_ since that day, and Will is actually _taller_ than her (if still undefinably scrawny) by a good three inches, Max feels like she might finally find out what it is that makes her friend so _damn resilient_ , what makes his life so horrifically unlivable.

Because _today_ , after Mike and Lucas and Jane and Dustin have all gone home, and she’s waiting for Mrs. Byers to finish up the dishes (because there is no way in _hell_ the woman is letting that _thing_ pick her up and take her back to her place), Will turns to her, a variation of that distance and vague ambivalence from the previous winter swallowing up his eyes, and beckons for her to retreat to his room, out of earshot.

Their DnD setup has yet to be dismantled when he sits her down on the bed and proceeds to stare intently at his hands, wringing them over one another on his lap.

Max doesn’t say a word, sits stock still and silent, but she watches, _waits,_ knowing full well that it’s moments like _these_ during which it wouldn’t do to miss a single fucking _breath._

After precisely five minutes and thirty-eight seconds of watching and  _waiting_ , he looks up, looks directly into her eyes, and speaks in a low, faint-but-not-meek, painstakingly _final_ whisper.

“I need to tell you something.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> WOOHOO! THE FIRST LINE OF DIALOGUE IN THE ENTIRE FUCKING FIC!!! I swear this is gonna pick up soon please don't give up on me I just wanted to get some basic characterization out of the way.
> 
> Leave Comments! Leave Criticism! Leave Memes! I honestly don't care what you write just please comment!!


	3. I Think I Fucked Up

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Nancy chuckles at the frustrated exclamation from the floor beside her bed, peering over the mattress to view the scraggly mess of papers scattered around the scraggly mess of the boy she calls hers.
> 
> God, she loves him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay, so. A couple of things with the timeline:
> 
> 1\. This chapter takes place over the winter break of the kiddos' sophomore year. It's been about a month since Will's Gay Epiphany[TM]  
> 2\. This, of course, puts Nancy and Jonathan in their senior year, meaning that Steve is done with highschool. He's taking a break year, for now, but he's applied to Indiana State.  
> 3\. PLEASE REMEMBER IT'S THE 80s. I love Max, but homosexuality isn't something she'd be all that accustomed to or okay with. Let my grill be conflicted.
> 
> K that's all I think. Enjoy!

_“Jonathan!”_

The door opens. A jingle of keys resonates in the living room. A series of dull thuds follows light footfalls and the sound of Joyce’s voice rings pervasively throughout the house.

Jonathan Byers hears none of it.

“Jonathan! Could you come here, sweetie?”

She tries again, peeling off her jacket and tossing it haphazardly onto the coathanger, where it immediately plops rather anticlimactically to the floor. She’s just dropped a fairly mortified-looking Max Mayfield off at her house, after ensuring unambiguously that the girl’s mom was home.

( _Max was pretty quiet_ , she’d acknowledged idly on her drive back, frowning faintly to herself at the uncharacteristic behavior of one of her son’s most conventionally talkative friends, second only to maybe Mike and Dustin. From the moment she’d met her, Joyce had taken an immediate liking to the girl. She was a good kid. Loud and crass and overzealous, sure, but no more so than the group of boys she was used to. She made for a nice addition to their little party, and she actually _talked_ to _her_ , even though she was just a boring grownup _._

 _Plus, she was_ really good _with Will._ )

Picking up the collapsed cloth with a grimace and growing distinguishably impatient, Joyce frowns, carding one hand through gradually graying, thin hair and planting the other on her hip, lips pursed taut in mild agitation.

“Jonathan!” she calls out louder this time, an irked inflection seeping ever so slightly into her voice, “come _here,_ please.”

(This time around, however, Joyce had received naught but radio silence from her passenger on their drive over to the Hargroves’. She’d let her vivid, stormy red hair fall obstructively over her face and slumped back in her seat, and Joyce had been half-convinced the girl was asleep until she’d spared a glance back at the stoplight, discovering her eyes to be blown wide and unblinking, _definitely_ conscious and terribly distraught.

Joyce knew better than to careen headfirst into interrogation mode, however, no matter how badly she wanted to. The woman was no stranger to the responsibilities, rules, and customary know-how’s of being a Mom; if the girl wanted to talk to her, she’d talk to her.

Until then--although it displeased her to _no end_ \--Joyce would just have to let Max mull out whatever it was that was occupying her in such a disgruntled way on her own.)

_“Jonathan!”_

Substantially irritated with her elder son--who was, indubitably, unable to hear her borderline _screeching_ because of those _damn headphones_ he always had on--Joyce huffs and grumbles inscrutably under her breath, eyebrows furrowing as she marches vexedly down the hall. In between Max’s distinct yet agonizingly _indecipherable_ apprehension regarding _lord knows what_ and her own frustration with the fucking noise-cancelling _atrocities_ Nancy Wheeler gifted her son last Christmas, only extraordinarily embellished by the fact that she’s just hosted six incredibly energetic and terribly _loud_ fifteen-year-olds, Joyce Byers is on her last legs.

As she turns irritably to knock as aggressively as she can on her son’s bedroom door, a loud _crash,_ succeeded by several raucous barks courtesy of Chester, sounds from about two rooms down, drawing her attention swiftly to the door belonging to her _other_ son.

She swivels in place, eyes bulging wide and hands shaking suddenly and irrationally, even though she knows _full well_ that the sound was probably just the accidental and entirely innocuous fumbling of furniture or tumbling of desk embellishments.

Her kid is fine. Will’s _fine._

\--Or so it appears until he yells out volatilely, and the family pupper’s escalating doggy screaming doesn’t rise to a volume high enough to drown out the string of _unpleasant_ words that Joyce, much like most unwitting, deliberately ignorant mothers of teenage boys, had been under the impression that her son didn’t know (or at least didn’t _use_ ).

At least for now, though, she’s more concerned about what happened to draw the exclamation of _“fuck shit damnit fucking bitch motherfucker!”_ out of her son’s mouth than the fact that he _swore_ in the first place.

Indulging in a few consolidating breaths before confronting the room that still turns her insides to ice everytime she sees it empty--even when its inhabitants are only temporarily evacuated in favor of eating in the kitchen or drawing in the living room, and she damn well _knows_ it--Joyce blinks once, then twice, and forces her feet out of their stagnant position, proceeding towards _god only knows_ whatever’s happening behind that door.

She knocks, and knocks again, in feeble attempts to muster up the fickle courage of which she discovers she has such a woeful deficiency.

The door swings open with deceptive, almost _cruel_ ease, and Joyce stands stock still in its absence, her eyes locked on her son--all fifteen years, seven months, five feet, six inches, and 100-something pounds of him.

And Will’s standing there, cowering over himself, his left hand cradled in his right, both stained _darker_ than Joyce remembers his flesh ever being, dripping-- _dripping?_ \--with emphatic viscosity onto the floor below him.

His eyes catch hers, seemingly in slow motion, and go implausibly wide, and all Joyce can see in that perpetual moment is the green green _green_ of the world going blank before her.

 _That,_ of course, and the goddamn fucking _dent_ in the bedroom wall.

 

|~~~|

 

Max doesn’t know all that much about Queers.

She knows that her dad wasn’t particularly fond of Them. She knows _Neil_ absolutely _despises_ Them (says they’re sick in the head, unnatural, an infestation, a crime against love and marriage as America knows it, etc etc). She knows about the Gay Disease that gets transferred through Them and ends up killing Them off, one by one. She knows San Francisco wasn't exactly _kind_ to Them, but compared to Hawkins, it was a goddamn _paradise_ . She knows that Being Gay in California was like receiving a free fast pass to Disneyland for every hate crime you were a victim of, and while the tradeoff didn't seem all that fair to Max, she supposed it was justified by the fact that _Their_ Disease was slaughtering millions. She knows that Being Gay in _Hawkins_ is like tattooing the words _“Punch me! Break my bones! Split my flesh! Make me bleed and swell up like I'm allergic to normalcy!_ in bright, fluorescent pink all across your face.

She knows that Queers go to hell, because apparently, God likes them even less than Neil does. She knows her mom says They could change, if They tried hard enough.

And now, she knows that Will Byers is one of Them.

And she has no clue what to do about it.

Because _Will Byers_ isn't a sissy-looking man who wears more makeup than local whores, and he's not a chick decked in leather jackets who pops bubble gum almost insolently and wears her hair half shaved down to her chin. He hasn't got piercings in weird places, doesn't prey on young boys (how _can_ he? He's a part of that population, himself), doesn't burn bibles for fun or spend his leisure hours high and drunk with some guy’s cock in his ass.

He's one of them, but he isn't one of _Them._

And when he _tells_ her, when he sits her down on his bed, fidgets restlessly with his twitching fingers and uncooperative eyes, and instigates a reprehensible staring contest with the ground for a full five minutes, before finally managing to fumble over the words, _“I think I'm Queer”,_ then immediately losing all the color in his cheeks, as if only upon seeing her disbelieving face does he realize the sheer magnitude of what he’s just said, and how he can never go back on it--when he _does all that,_ even as her mind projects in the backdrop of her eyes the broken record stuck on repeat of all the _shit_ Neil’s said about _Them,_ all Max wants to do is scramble up _her_ Will into her arms, and make the moisture in his eyes go away, and hug him until her shoulders all but _dislodge_ from their sockets and fall out of her body.

(It's a little surprising, really, how the imminent knowledge that Will is even less normal than he was _before_ he was gay doesn't have any real impact on how Max sees him. Even in that moment, knowing incorrigibly that the boy before her will never marry a nice woman and have nice children, will probably grow up into one of _Them,_ with Their smarmy hands and Their predatory gazes--might even end up _dying_ from _Their_ Disease--it doesn't make her at all disgusted, and nowhere _near_ as uncomfortable as she probably ought to be.

Instead, all she can think of is a time when she was younger, remembering how her dad once pushed back her vibrant red hair so it didn't obstruct her big, bulbous eyes, and said to her, _“Don’t ever go out of your way to try to be normal, Maxie. Normal people never do anything worth remembering.”_ )

And, one of _Them_ or not, Max knows, knows without a twinge of uncertainty, a dabble of doubt, an ounce of ambivalence, or a shred of skepticism, that Will Byers, _her_ Will Byers, the boy who knows the difference between a _B_ and an _HB_ and a _BB_ pencil, who lets Jane Hopper braid flowers into his hair because hers isn't cooperative enough, who listens with his entire skinny little body when Mike narrates a Campaign, even though his narrations get repetitive and predictable after the first few you’ve witnessed--she knows for a _fact_ that Will Byers deserves to be remembered.

(And _that,_ she thinks, with a shrewd, nervous, _audacious_ half-smile playing on her lips, is a lot more than she can say she knows about Queers.)

 

|~~~|

 

He’s never felt like more of an _idiot_.

Not when he accidentally crashed his bike into a tree when he was seven. Not when he almost drowned after agreeing to go to the lake with his friends in spite of his inconvenient and hitherto unacknowledged lack of the ability to swim.

(Not when he strayed away from Lucas and Dustin and Mike nearly two years ago, for fear that whatever was inside him might try to hurt them, without ever explaining _why_ he was being such a distant, apathetic asshole.)

In fact, in all his fifteen years, seven months, and thirty days of life, Will Byers is absolutely, positively, completely, 100% downright _certain_ that this is the _stupidest_ thing he’s ever done.

A couple of months ago, he’d rationalized that the whole _Being Gay_ thing was something he really ought to keep to himself. Revealing it would only make people uncomfortable, and he’d be--if it were even _possible_ \--somehow _more_ of a freak than he already was. He told himself that, no matter what happened, no matter how desolate and desperate and wrong and overwhelmed he felt, he’d _never_ let anyone else know he was a real-life actual fucking faggot.

And, in the interest of fairness, that resolve had actually lasted him a pretty decently long while, until this fucking morning, when, like the milk in the back of your fridge that one day surprises you by replacing the smooth, creamy beverage it usually upholds with sour, moist chunks that plop noncommittally into your cereal, it went and expired.

 _He can't fucking believe he told her_.

He's not even entirely sure what inclined him to so daftly let slip the one thing, the _one fucking stupid insignificant disgraceful_ aspect of himself that he'd vowed to no one in particular to keep secret, to the first person he happened to see that day. He _knew_ this would’ve happened. He fucking _knew it._ This wasn't one of those things that could simply be overlooked or forgiven, wasn't like the mind flayer or the demogorgon or fuck knows whatever else he might've exposed the world to. In those cases, he’d been used as a pawn: a pitiable, faultless tool on whom none of the blame could logically be placed.

Now, however, he wasn't just an innocuous victim.

Now, _he_ was the empirical beast threatening to end the world as it was known.

God, he’s _such_ an imbecile.

(And he figures, since he’s already surpassed his quota for inexplicable stupidity today, why start using his brain now? It just wouldn’t make sense.)

So, he punches the wall.

He’s desolate and desperate and overwhelmed and wrong, and he’s been desolate and desperate and overwhelmed and wrong for so goddamn _long._ Since the first time his dad’s hand and his own face became almost indistinguishable. Since the first time the kids at school decided he was _just_ scrawny and weird enough to prove a decent target without seeming pathetic. Since he died. Since he _came back_ from the dead. Since he nearly killed everyone he ever loved.

(Not your _fault,_ Will--)

Since the first time he put his hands on a girl’s waist and looked into her eyes and knew with every ounce of his being _(which was, admittedly, not very many ounces)_ that he didn’t _want_ this. Since his brother started spending too much time with Nancy Wheeler, and he thought maybe it was a family curse of some sort.

(Since Mike Wheeler’s smile became the one and only thing he needed to get through every desolate, desperate, overwhelming, godawful day.)

...

He punches the wall, and it solves nothing.

He’s still desolate and desperate and overwhelmed and wrong.

(and alone)

Except _now,_ he’s desolate, desperate, overwhelmed, wrong, _and_ bleeding.

There’s a hole in his wall.

(He kind of wishes there was one in his _head,_ instead.)

 

|~~~|

 

“Would someone care to explain when I’m _ever_ going to need this weird-ass squiggly _E_ in my life?”

Nancy chuckles at the frustrated exclamation from the floor beside her bed, peering over the mattress to view the scraggly mess of papers scattered around the scraggly mess of the boy she calls hers.

Jonathan’s got his lips tucked into a frown, and _damn,_ does that ever make her want to kiss them _right the fuck off his face_ , and his bushy eyebrows are furrowed so his forehead wrinkles in adorable stupefaction. His hair’s stuck out in irritated tufts in all different directions, and when she pats it down, his head whips up, an expression of alert befuddlement courting his features.

“Do you mean _a sigma_?” she asks with a soft chortle, letting her ponytail trickle over her shoulder and blinking at the chicken-scratch attempt at Σ notation scrawled over Jonathan’s papers.

Jonathan heaves a sigh and lets his back flop unceremoniously against the bed, borderline _whining._

 _“Ahi haye maffh,”_ he groans into the soft pale pink cloth draped over the bedding, burrowing his face into Nancy’s sheets. His hair droops in a curtain obscuring his eyes. Nancy’s fingers are still buried in his scalp.

The girl has, meanwhile, taken it upon herself to gather up her boyfriend’s homework and scour through his math problems, gaze flickering through the illegible scribbling as her countenance grows more and more confused.

“These--these are all _correct_ , Jonathan.”

Her voice lilts a bit at the end, almost as if it’s a question, as she turns to glance inquisitively at the boy, one eyebrow curiously raised.

Jonathan groans, _louder_ this time, and shifts so he’s no longer suffocating in her blankets.

“Still hate it,” he mumbles, and Nancy, who very adamantly and unashamedly threw away the final fractions of restraint she possessed nearly two years ago, plants her palms on his shoulders and presses her lips to his mouth.

( _It was different when she kissed Steve,_ she remembers. Although, she supposes that’s a given; Steve’s an entirely different person. Still, though. It’s hard not to think about how much more chapped Jonathan’s lips are, how much more tautly drawn. Steve had been, for lack of a better term, _loose._ His maneuvering was fluid, relaxed, nonchalant. Jonathan’s _fiercer,_ more deliberate, exploring, unambiguous. Steve’s kisses were like hot, viscous honey and his touch was light and fleeting and feathery, but _smooth_ enough to give her chills. Jonathan’s kisses are more insistent; not aggressive, but punctuated, the clasp of his hands over hers and the sensation of his warmth draped to her body lingering and immovable like a particularly heavy comforter on a frosty winter morning. Steve was an air bed. Jonathan is memoryfoam.)

She loves him.

_(Bullshit.)_

She _loves_ him.

_(It’s bullshit.)_

She _loves him._

“I love you.”

She says it before she can stop herself. _(She threw away the final fractions of restraint she possessed nearly two years ago.)_ The words leave her lips before she can think them through, and then they’re gone, and she _knows_ she can’t take them back.

Jonathan freezes with his hands gripped in her hair and his lips etched on her jaw, and she can _feel_ the memoryfoam turn to stone beneath her.

He unlatches from her body slowly, and the rise and fall of his chest is still set in time with hers, and his eyes are blown wide and he’s _gaping._ Petrified, paralyzed, with her fingers still tentatively twisted into his shirt, Nancy scrambles up, her hair askew with the force of static as her breath catches in her throat, and she waits for him to say something, _anything._

_(Bullshit.)_

Instead, she hears the door open downstairs, and her mom enters the house.

(And if Mrs. Wheeler’s home, it means it’s 6 P.M.

And if it’s 6 P.M, Jonathan’s already late for dinner.

And if Jonathan’s late for dinner, the first person Joyce is sure to call is her good friend, Karen Wheeler.

 _Karen Wheeler,_ whose children know good and well that they’re not allowed to date until they’re out of the house and out of her sight.

 _Karen Wheeler,_ whose daughter’s long-term secret boyfriend is upstairs, right now, studiously reviewing the slopes of Nancy’s body and the velocity of her hands and lips and fingers.

 _Karen Wheeler,_ who hasn’t left a phone call unanswered since her children both collectively decided that _life-preservation_ wasn’t all that high on their list of priorities.)

The phone rings, once, twice, three times.

And then it stops ringing, and Karen speaks into the receiver.

“Oh, _hi_ Joyce!”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Holy shitballs I'm alive!!!  
> I'm really sorry if this chapter's not up to par I'm really discontent with it.  
> Still, please leave a comment and I'll try to be faster!  
> Thank you!!!!!


	4. I Think I Ought To Be OK By Now...

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> He’s pretty sure he’s sprained his ankle--badly--and he’s even surer that Nancy Wheeler just told him she loved him for the first time, ever. 
> 
> He’s not sure which of these certainties is more alarming.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Alternatively titled: everything gets gayer and Mike Wheeler is so fucking smitten yall

Mike was only just barely thirteen when his best friend died.

He was thirteen when he watched, wide eyed and weary and disbelieving and _hopeless_ , as they dragged his water-sodden corpse out of the lake just off the quarry.

(No kid that small should ever be a corpse. It's not right. It's not _fair._ )

He was thirteen when he learned that sometimes, surviving was the worst thing that could possibly happen to you. When he discovered that anyone, _anyone at all_ , could die whenever they damn well pleased. That dying wasn't just for old, sick people in hospital wards.

(Of course, he'd already known this. Known objectively that everyone would die, at some point. That not everybody lived to _be_ old and sick and stuck in a hospital ward.)

But _kids--_ healthy, happy, friendly, _good_ ( _so_ good. So deliriously _fucking good)_ kids--weren't supposed to die for no reason at all. That kind of stuff, those tragedies and heartbreaks and irreparable losses; they only happened in books and movies.

(He remembers when he got the invitation to the funeral. Remembers how terribly sick and distraught that stupid, curly, cursive _cordially requested presence_ had made him, because what kind of kid has to go to his friend’s funeral? Kids don't _have_ funerals _._ Kids have birthday parties and sleepovers where they laugh too hard and then get in trouble for being too loud. They don't sit solemnly in formal suits and ties and listen to some droning old man claiming to be spiritually connected to _god_ while watching their friends being lowered into the _fucking ground._ )

Mike isn't all that sure he even _believes_ in god, anymore. How can he, after everything he's seen? What kind of god would let people like Will Byers and Jane Hopper go through shit like _that_ , without recompensation, without any rhyme or reason? What kind of god would let a baby girl be ripped from her life--literally wrenched _kicking_ and _screaming_ \--out of her mother’s arms, to be tested and prodded and tortured until she was a resilient enough weapon to fight in a war that wasn't even happening? What kind of god would make a child endure hell so sacrilegious, it transformed a home into a prison? Into a _death trap_?

What kind of god would let lonely teenage girls be devoured alive by real-life monsters? Would let a mother torment day after day after wretched day to find her own dead child? Would let something beyond the realm of reality take a person’s body hostage and strain it til it was no longer a person?

Not any god Mike Wheeler wants to follow, _that's_ for sure.

(He remembers the day _of_ the funeral, when his mom took his hands--they had been small enough to fit perfectly into hers, back then--and squeezed them, and told him to _pray_ for Will Byers so his soul could go to heaven.

Mike didn't _want_ Will Byers to be in heaven.

He wanted him to be _here._ )

Another thing Mike had learned when he was thirteen: when you watch someone die, it sticks with you.

Even if said someone doesn't _stay_ dead for very long, it doesn't go away.

He learned that, no matter how many hours you spend tediously studying the motions of their breath, the twitch of their lips, the warmth of their cheeks, the breadth of their bones, the movements of their _life_ \--no matter how hard you try to memorize their inherent _aliveness_ , to etch every laugh and blink and touch into the backs of your eyelids, you can’t _ever_ escape the haunting, insidious memory of only ever _once_ seeing their cadaver.

Their _dead fucking body_ never leaves you be, no matter how much you wish it would.

 _(No matter how much you_ pray _it would_ . _)_

But, Mike discovers with time, it _does_ get easier. The nightmares, the recollections, the goddamn fucking _fear_ \--they don't go _away,_ but they _do_ fade into something less sinister, something almost tolerable.

They become something that can be gratuitously shooed and shoved away into the furthest possible crevice of your mind by the sound of your name on their lips, or the smell of the detergent they use, or the way you can feel their giggles resonating throughout their body when you sit close enough to them to bathe in the radiance of their human, _living_ warmth.

So it makes _sense_ that whenever Mike’s heart starts beating too fast, or his mind starts leaping to the worst _possible_ conclusion, or his mouth speaks words his thoughts have yet to verify, Will’s fingers slotted between his own, his body _(alive, breathing, warm, wonderful,_ alive _)_ pressed up against his, his hair tickling the bare skin of his neck--it makes _sense_ that his presence alone makes Mike feel better, safer, _stronger_.

It makes _sense_ that the physical proof of Will Byers’ life gives him the strength to live his.

 

|~~~|

 

He’s pretty sure he’s sprained his ankle-- _badly_ \--and he’s even _surer_ that Nancy Wheeler just told him she loved him for the first time, ever.

He’s _not_ sure which of these certainties is more alarming.

Jonathan limps off the Wheeler property as gingerly and briskly as he can with the sparks of stubborn, ceaseless pain angrily shooting up his hamstrings and straining the tendons in his leg with every step he takes. The sting is made bitter by the cold, which sneaks impudently over his goosepimpled flesh even through the fabric of his jeans and jacket. He's slung his backpack over one shoulder, attempting to disperse some of the weight he's got to balance out with his lame leg.

(There's something impeccably _fitting_ about the fact that the same girl who just told him she _loved_ him all but _shoved_ him out of her window less than a minute later.)

Once he's determined that he’s well out of Mrs. Wheeler’s _Sexual-Activity-Spotting_ range of sheer, unparalleled mom power, Jonathan steals a glance back at the house, smiling despite himself as he notes that the light in Nancy’s bedroom is now on.

_She’s always hated studying in the dark._

(Sometimes, he truly can't believe it's been over a year since she kissed him for the first time. In all honesty, he's not convinced he even recalls what life was like before her lips played an integral role in his day-to-day function, and, frankly, he doesn't _want_ to. He doubts he could bear to go on without her, at this point. She's his tether--she keeps him stable and sound and sane.)

He supposes he loves her.

He supposes he loves her a whole awful lot.

(Even though she nearly _broke his leg_ kicking him out of her house.)

He _also_ supposes he's got the _dumbest_ , most spectacularly lovesick smile on his face when he trips on an uneven part of the sidewalk and loses his balance, sprawling insensibly over the pavement--

\--And _almost_ getting run over by Steve Harrington’s car.

“What the actual _fuck,_ Byers!”

 

|~~~|

 

It's a couple of weeks after Jane Hopper’s birthday in ‘85 that Mike, for the first time in a long, _long_ time, gets to spend a whole day alone with Will Byers, their company untainted by _hospitals_ or _doctors_ or inexplicable _dying_.

Ever since he _came back_ over a year ago, Mike’s found that his best friend’s schedule has almost always been occupied by either a myriad of medical professionals or his mother’s (admittedly justifiable) overbearing, possessive, borderline _vulture-like_ nature.

Fast forward a few months and Will Byers appears to have been relinquished from his unofficial house arrest, but he's still always, _always_ accompanied by at least one other person.

(Which, _okay,_ Mike supposes that’s also pretty justified. Lucas and Dustin have missed him just as much as he has, after all; they lost a best friend, _too._ Of _course_ they're eager to be around him. And it's probably for the best that teachers are instructed to look out for him, and he’s chaperoned just about everywhere by his older brother, because _being resurrected_ from the _fucking dead_ isn't exactly a glaring statement of orthodoxy.

And in Hawkins, if you're not _normal,_ you're one of two things:

1) a conversation piece

or 2) a _target_

Will Byers just so happens to have the ineffable, _extraordinary_ pleasure of being _both_.)

And then _Max_ shows up, and everything gets all the more hectic and confusing and insane, and, _yeah_ \--Dustin and Lucas’s fallout (over some _girl,_ of all things) allows for Mike to spend a few precious ( _albeit disconcerting_ ) moments alone with the boy he’s discovered he can't even go  _seven damn days_ without.

But then the goddamn _Upside Down_ makes an egregiously unwelcome reappearance in their lives, and it all goes to shit.

 _Now,_ though; now, things _finally_ seem to be looking up.

El’s back (for _good_ , this time!), and Max, he concedes, isn't as insufferable as he initially took her to be, and _Will_ is _okay._

 _(And maybe, just_ maybe _, he’ll_ stay _okay this time around.)_

And now that the stupid _girlfriend_ bullshit is all cleared up, and Dustin and Lucas have (finally) stopped being total fucking _babies_ , the Party’s grown to be stronger than _ever_ before _._

Mike’s at the happiest he’s been in _years_ when his mom knocks on his door, letting him know that there's a phone call waiting for him.

A phone call on the other side of which is one anxious, almost _meek_ Will Byers, asking if _maybe_ Mike wants to spend the day over at his place.

He’s on his bike and pedaling away before Will can even finish the question.

 _(As it turns out, Lucas has finally grown the_ balls _to ask out Max Mayfield, and they're going to the cinema together this afternoon--although, in Mike's opinion,_ ‘The Goonies’ _doesn't sound like an all too romantic film, but hey! What does he know? Hell. What does he_ care _? He finally gets to spend some goddamn alone time with Will_ Fucking _Byers--Lucas can take her to A Nightmare On Elm Street for all the shits he gives!)_

With their Ranger and their ( _for fuck’s sake_ ) “Zoomer” priorly engaged, the Party’s typical weekly campaign arrangement is out of the question. Thus, the majority of the gang has opted for something _different_ this weekend--Dustin is out with Steve (who, although initially indignant about his newly assigned title of _‘Group Mom’_ , seems to have adjusted adequately), and Hopper’s taken some shifts off so that El can be with _her_ dad, too.

Which leaves Will and Mike all by their lonesome.

(He's literally _never_ been fucking happier.)

When he knocks on the door and it’s _Will_ who answers--a Will that doesn’t look haggard and fatigued and broken and abused, one who’s wearing a scraggly, unstifled smile that reveals the tiny gap between his front two teeth--Mike is balefully reminded of just how _badly_ he missed this.

He steps inside and slips out of his shoes just in time for Chester to careen in like a thumping series of plummeting bullets, scrambling into the living room to investigate the door opening and alert his family about the presence of any potential intruders. He _woofs_ animatedly for a couple of minutes, before recognizing that his owner’s completely ignoring all his alarming appeals, and resorts to moping stubbornly at Mike’s feet.

Mike, in turn, crouches down to scratch dotingly between the dog’s ears, and laughs.

(He’s afraid he’ll _cry_ otherwise.)

Because even after a year, six months, and fifteen days of being scared and sheltered and shattered and sullen--

_(and desolate and desperate and overwhelmed and wrong)_

\--Will Byers is still very much the same.

 _Everything_ is still very much the same.  

Only, now. It’s _better._

Will laughs at something he says, and Mike forgets how to breathe.

 

|~~~|

 

Vaguely, Jonathan registers a smattering of swears as Steve opens his car door and clambers frantically out, the slam of said door behind him ricocheting abjectly in his ears, panging and clanging over vicious spasms of sharp pain and inducing a dizzying sensation of something that feels an awful lot like vertigo.

 _“Ow,”_ he says pointedly to the gravel, and to Steve’s shoe, which has taken residence right beside his face.

“ _Shit,_ dude,” Steve replies breathily, and Jonathan, even with his cheek pressed snugly to the concrete, (getting chummily acquainted with the loose bits of road that will no doubt leave a lovely pattern of scratches along the side of his face even after he manages to scrape them off), can _perfectly_ picture the young man’s hand being so familiarly carded through his still ludicrously long hair.

The very _thought_ of the sight is almost enough to send him spiraling into a hysterical fit of giggles.

(Or maybe that’s just the pain and shock-engendered delirium kicking in, as the smell of the rubber tires literally _inches_ away from flattening him like a wad of particularly petulant dough wafts tenaciously to his nostrils.)

Steve’s looking at him as though he’s crazy. Jonathan’s sure of it.

“What the hell were you doing? _Are you okay?”_

He sounds frantic. Concerned.

_(Frightened?)_

It’s then that Jonathan realizes he hasn’t moved a muscle since he fell.

He picks himself up quickly, protesting spurs of pain indignantly relenting in his limbs and scorching at his skin where the impact with the street imprinted over his flesh. Ignoring this, he ambles to his feet, clearing his throat and wincing.

“Yuh-yeah, I’m fine. Fucking peachy.”

Jonathan flinches at the gruff, scratchy sound of his voice catching in his throat (fucking _traitorous_ piece of shit) and can’t help but feel like he’s fallen short of convincing even _himself_ that he’s _“fucking peachy.”_

Steve’s got an eyebrow raised at him, eyes boring into the bloody gravel concentrated about his jawline. His lips purse into a tight, unimpressed frown, and his arms cross over his chest, gaze narrowed to two dark brown, disbelieving slits.

 _“Right,”_ he remarks dubiously, running his fingers across his scalp once more and exhaling distrustfully.

(Jonathan has to stifle a barking laugh as his hair makes its gradual descent back to earth.)

“You need a ride?” Steve migrates back to the car, opening the door and gesticulating with a nod of his head for Jonathan to get in the passenger’s seat.

The latter, in turn, blinks and coughs awkwardly, feet still planted in place for fear of losing balance if he tries to move.

“Is that why you’re here?” he asks, brushing the irritating, scratchy road residue off his cheekbone with the stint of his shoulder, “to abduct me?”

Steve snorts, leaning over his now-opened door to grin at him.

“Yeah. You got me. I was actually planning on tossing you into the lake, but now I’m wondering if burying you alive would be more efficient. What d’ya think?

Jonathan wrinkles his nose and deadpans in all seriousness.

“Oh, _god._ Buried alive, _please._ It’s way too cold to be at the lake right now.”

Steve full on _beams,_ and Jonathan assures himself that it’s just the riveting chill and demanding, ubiquitous ache in his left leg that makes his friend’s laugh feel so damn infectious.

“I like the way you think, Byers,” Steve says wistfully, before smacking a hand decisively against the car’s windowpane and beckoning him over with the other one. “Really, though. Ms. Byers’ll parade my head on a stick or something if you show up home late _and_ looking like you got hit by a semi.”

And, putting two and two together and getting _five,_ Jonathan’s mouth falls open and he bluthers out indignantly:

“ _Wait._ My _mom_ sent you to come all the way here and _get_ me?”

Steve nods, snickering at the baffled expression on the other man’s face, and adjusts his own hair for the _third time_ in the past ten minutes.

“Yeah? C’mon, dude. You didn’t really think she’d put all her eggs in _Mrs. Wheeler’s_ basket, did you? I mean, no offense to Nancy’s mom, but the woman _did,”_ Steve pauses, pressing his lips into a thin line and shrugging, “ _y’know._ ”

Almost have an affair with borderline psychotic _minor_ Billy Hargrove a couple of years back? Yeah. Jonathan _did_ know.

“Yeah, I guess,” he grimaces, giving in and moving to take a step towards the car.

(He _almost_ forgets about his twisted ankle for a second. _Almost._ )

The moment he starts forward with his right foot, however, his left one gives way, angrily burning under the force of the pressure and uneven distribution of weight Jonathan’s placed on it, and he stumbles _again_.

Except _this time_ he falls into the cushiony fabric of Steve’s jacket, whose arms clasp tightly around him to break his fall, clutching to his shoulders and catching him in his chest.

(He’ll admit: it's a lot better than the cold, unforgiving concrete he landed on last time.)

“ _Woah!_ ” Steve’s demeanor does a goddamn 180 as he helps Jonathan get back upright, hands still pinned on his shoulders. “ _Fuck_ , what happened? What did you do to your foot?”

“ _I_ didn’t do anything,” Jonathan groans, never one to care too much about insignificant things like _dignity_ to keep from leaning on another person for support, and not at _all_ minding when Steve’s arm finds its way around his middle and holds him firmly in place, “Nancy pushed me out of the window.”

Steve freezes, an expression of astonished befuddlement written plainly across his features, although Jonathan’s not looking at him, and can’t exactly see it.

“Uh, _what?_ ”

Jonathan waves his hand disarmingly, grunting lowly in lieu of an explanation. His face has assumed a look of concentration; screwed up with his tongue poking ever-so-discreetly out of lips as he does his best to regain the use of his pesky leg.

“Nevermind,” he grumbles, “just drive me home.”

“Yeah, _no.”_ Steve helps him hobble to the passenger’s seat, and the churning, revelling pain sharpening itself like a rusty axe grinding against Jonathan’s leg is too sharp and loud for him to protest the assistance. “You’re not going home like this.”

He gestures to Jonathan’s general appearance, and Jonathan doesn’t even have the energy to be offended. Or _argue,_ for that matter.

“Then where do _you_ propose we go, genius?” he asks complacently, instead.

Steve ducks into the driver’s side, closing the door and buckling his seatbelt, not even batting an eyelid as he reaches over and does the same with Jonathan’s. The guy’s been chauffeuring kids for _way_ too long.

“I dunno. I was thinking we stop by at the ER on the way back, make sure nothing’s bro-”

_“No.”_

Jonathan sits up straighter, and when Steve turns to look at him, he’s practically _glaring._ Steely gray eyes _grill_ him as Jonathan’s lips morph into a scowl.

“I’m not going to a hospital,” he says curtly, and Steve gawks at him.

“Are you shitting me? Your _leg_ could be _broken_ \--”

“It’s _fine._ Just drop me off at home.”

And suddenly, the pain seems to have dulled and faded, reminiscent only really as an echo, and Jonathan’s more than happy to prepare a fully fledged fucking _debate_ to run against Steve if he elects to push it.

He averts his gaze, coldly, and moves to cross his arms, but Steve grabs his wrist and holds it sternly in place, eyebrows furrowing.

“Hey, man,” he starts, confused and agitated and solicitous all at once, “I dunno what your problem is, but we are _going_ to go get that foot checked out.”

 _“No,”_ Jonathan snaps back with uncharacteristic ferocity, “we are _not._ ”

He tries to pull away from Steve again, but the guy’s persistent; he doesn’t so much as _blink_ as he levels with him, glowering. His grip on Jonathan’s arm only tightens.

“Look, you could be actually hurt, and I _know_ you know that, so stop being an _ass_ about it and let me take you to the hospital. I’ll call your mom when we get there.”

_“No!”_

Jonathan all but shouts, wrenching his hand free and turning petulantly in his seat to face away from his friend, almost _huffing._

For a few silent seconds, Steve is rendered absolutely speechless; never in his life has he witnessed Jonathan Byers acting so _stubborn_ and _infantile_ \--not even when Jonathan Byers was _literally_ a stubborn infant: the only kid in their preschool classroom that had to have orange juice instead of milk because he was something called _Lack-toes Intawlerent_ (which, in all honesty, Steve had at the time feared meant there was something wrong with his toes).

But it's for good reason that Steve Harrington is tauntingly referred to as _“Mom”_ by Hawkins’ own personal _Losers Club_ full of  _Goonies_ ; he recovers damn fucking fast, and can interchange between _awestruck teen_ and _strict paternal figure_ in about 2.57 seconds, tops.

Which is why Jonathan is only _mildly_ surprised when Steve starts the ignition of the vehicle, locks all the doors in the car, and fucking _books_ it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> JFVOUFEEWCF OKAY IM SORRY THAT THE ENDING SEEMS ABRUPT IF IT FEELS CUT OFF THAT'S BECAUSE IT IS THIS CHAPTER JUST TOTALLY GOT AWAY FROM ME!
> 
> Seriously, it got so long, just this half took up five pages in docs. I had to split it in two.
> 
> Anyway, expect the next update soon-ish (hopefully?) and I'm sorry this is such a dsfcowej Mess[TM]
> 
> Please comment yall's essays and remarks feed my soul


	5. ...But The Thing Is, I'm Not

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Because, while he may be quite a bit less stupid than he was when he decided to put all his weight upon a branch of the tree in his backyard that was so thin, birds wouldn’t even nest in it, Steve Harrington is still very much prone to crash and burn at any given moment.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The girl who told you the next update was gonna be soon? Yeah, that bitch is a liar. 
> 
> Anyway this is a substantially long chapter and completely unedited so uhhhh enjoy dying!

“Okay, I'm confiscating this.”

Fourteen-year-old Will Byers plucks the crayon Mike has been furiously scribbling with out of his clamped hand, wearing a soft, pensive smile in attempts to appease the unbridled rage his friend has been viciously projecting onto the poor piece of paper lying in front of him for the past couple of minutes, and hoping he doesn’t end up on the receiving end of it as a result. 

Mike looks up from where he's sprawled on his stomach on the floor, blinking at him through dark tufts of hair--hair that has grown  _ far too long _ for a “respectable boy of his age,” according to Mrs. Wheeler--and then picks up another crayon and  _ continues to scribble.  _

Will takes that one, too, and groans audibly. 

“ _ Mike _ , c'mon, what the hell is up with you? You were literally  _ fine  _ two minutes ago, and then I come back from the bathroom and you've been, like,  _ possessed _ by some wax-wasting demon.” 

Mike makes an indistinguishable noise of some sort as opposed to offering an actual answer, and shrugs unhelpfully, eyebrows knitted together so his forehead wrinkles up like a soggy prune. His fingers are curled so tightly into his palms, Will’s afraid his fists might just shatter from the sheer force of pressure, and is almost tempted to give back one of the crayons, so that Mike can break  _ that  _ instead of his own hand.

“Mike,” he tries again, biting his lip and assuming a tentative position pretzeled on the carpet, legs crossed over one another and hands picking awkwardly at the knees of his jeans, “Mike, you’re being super weird.”  

Mike barely even blinks, staring steadfastly at the sheet in front of him, hunched over it as though the thing has personally  _ wronged  _ him, and his curled, balled-up hands appear to have started  _ vibrating _ . Will can’t see his face--it’s obfuscated by a curtain of dark brown bangs, hair tucked haphazardly behind his ear, which has gone a bright, flourishing  _ red _ \--but after almost a decade of knowing the boy trembling inconspicuously before him, Will doesn’t have to be able to see his expression to know with absolute certainty that his friend’s a long,  _ long _ way from alright. 

He places a trepidatious hand over Mike’s crumpled knuckles, and the latter honest-to-god  _ snaps  _ up like a malfunctioning foldable table, his brown eyes blown to massive, wavering ocular lenses, shot to all hell and holding a suspicious moisture that accumulates above his lower lashes and threatens to spill over his eyelids. 

Will blinks, taken aback, and his mouth falls agape into a small letter  _ o _ as he freezes in place; he's never seen Mike cry before. 

_ (Well. Not  _ never. _ ) _

He takes pride in the fact that he doesn't cry around his friends. 

_ (There was that  _ one _ time.) _

Hell. He doesn’t cry around  _ anyone.  _ Will’s not sure if it’s a shame thing, or--

_ (You remember that, don’t you, Will?) _

\--or something else entirely, but  _ this _ ? The tears clinging depravedly to his eyes and peering over the planes of his face when he blinks? Will doesn't like  _ this _ one little bit; it's just not  _ right.  _

_ (Do you remember?)  _

Still, he doesn't withdraw his hand, instead letting his own fingers find a reaffirming residence woven within the spaces between Mike's, and the latter eventually clutches back, latching onto him with a vice grip that Will’s pretty sure cuts off his blood circulation within a whopping two seconds. 

With Mike’s lanky arms out of the way, and the thing he was so ferociously glowering at uncovered, it becomes pretty evident what exactly had managed to rile the boy up so badly--what was etched onto that thin piece of paper lying innocuously on the floor in front of him, the one he was just attacking with Will’s shoddy coloring supplies. 

(Will’s pretty sure it’s physically impossible, but he swears to  _ God _ that every organ in his body plummets a good  _ foot _ when he sees it; his heart thuds tremulously in his stomach, lungs pounding pointedly against his ribcage; his tongue goes dry and cumbersome as his esophagus sinks to his intestines and leaves his throat to shrivel up and  _ choke  _ him. 

His mouth is still strung stupidly open, but he can’t seem to force words out of it.) 

Because sitting sinisterly on the carpeted floor of the Byers’ living room is the 11 by 9, standard, entirely unassuming, scrawled sketch of something heinous that looks like it was taken directly out of a Stephen King novel: a large, arachnid-type creature looming over an unsuspecting, excruciatingly oblivious city. 

The drawing Will himself made a little less than a year ago.

_ (Himself. But not  _ really _ himself. Not  _ just  _ himself.)  _

He hears blood beating in his ears. His face drains of any pigment it might’ve once held. It feels like he’s been somehow transported to the bottom of the mariana trench, the pressure of everything surrounding him unforgivingly  _ constricting _ him, weighing down upon him,  _ around  _ him, all fucking  _ over _ him.

Oh god, he’s gonna be  _ sick.  _

(He feels cold. It’s all so cold. Fucking  _ shit,  _ how he hates the cold.)

“Wuh-huh-huh- _ where _ did you find that?” Will whispers. His teeth chatter and his voice emerges in a feeble stammer of sorts, his tongue suddenly feeling much too large for his mouth. He repeats himself, more harshly than he intends to. 

_ “Where?”  _

Mike’s reply is almost too quiet to hear, muffled in the fabric of his own collar with his head ducked down and his shoulders arched defensively over himself.

(Will knows that position all too well. The  _ ‘please for the love of god don’t look at me I’m about to break down fuck shit damnit’  _ stature. Will  _ is  _ that position.)

“It wuzh umfher the sofuh,” he murmurs, and Will glances at the drawing, then under the living room couch where it had presumably been reclining all this time, and then back at the drawing. 

And  _ that’s _ when he notices something that makes the bile crawling stealthily up to his mouth subside slightly, if only for a moment. 

The drawing--which he  _ knows _ he had sketched only in the haphazard, smudgy lead from his shitty school pencil--has been vandalized aggressively by sharp strokes of vicious, vindictive orange crayon. 

The crayon Will’s got held tightly in one of his fists at this very moment.

Will draws in a breath that emerges as a weak laugh, and, discovering that his hand is still sheltered in Mike’s, gives his friend’s palm a grateful squeeze. 

“Well, fuck,” he mutters intelligently, and Mike snickers wheezily, sniffling loudly and letting himself teeter over so as to bury his nose in the cloth clinging off of Will’s shoulder. 

“M’sorry, I jus’...” 

He looks up at him then, and Will realizes just how unaccustomed he is to  _ Mike _ looking  _ up  _ at  _ him _ . His eyes seem bigger, for some reason. Darker. 

“I don't even know, man. It just...pissed me off, y’know?”

Will did know. He  _ does  _ know. He’ll always know, no matter how badly he wants not to. But in that moment, staring at the solemn, unattainably defeated look in his friend’s damp gaze, Will can't bring himself to waste even a fraction of a nanosecond thinking about the otherworldly monstrosity that once inhabited his body, turned all ninety-two pounds of him into an earth-shattering weapon of mass destruction. 

(The one that's sitting on his floor right now, conveniently forgotten about for the time being, donning a remarkably bright orange sundress and a pretty, matching vermillion bonnet in its updated state.)

“I know,” he says quietly, because he's not sure what else he ought to say, not sure if he  _ can  _ say anything more. 

(Even if he can, he doesn't need to. It's enough. He gets the suspicion that, at least with Mike, it'll  _ always  _ be enough.) 

Mike loosens his death grip, and Will swears he can  _ feel  _ the veins and capillaries in his hand expand greedily at the sudden influx of oxygen that surges potently through him. 

(He decides not to think about how instantly he misses Mike’s hand once it's gone, even though it  _ was _ probably crushing his.) 

But then Mike’s arms wind around him, tightly, as if the looser their hold, the more likely Will is to slip out of their grasp, and all of a sudden, he's the warmest he's ever been. 

(He tries not to think about how this is so much  _ better _ . 

He tries. 

And he fails. 

Oh, good  _ God _ , how he fails.)

 

|~~~|

 

Steve doesn’t take him straight to the hospital. Jonathan’ll consider that a victory. 

He  _ does,  _ however, stop the car in the driveway of a house Jonathan doesn’t recognize, which is pretty damn alarming.

“Okay, Byers. Here’s the deal.” 

He shifts the gear into park, and the ratty old BMW he calls a functioning vehicle hisses insubordinately to a stop, prattling down like a particularly fussy baby finally agreeing to go to sleep. Jonathan glances over, eyebrows raised and countenance chary, and although every logical human neuron in him knows that  _ no,  _ idiot, Steve is  _ not  _ going to murder you in some stranger’s house, his pesky sense of irrational instinct is very adamantly telling him to  _ fucking run, you dumbass bitch!  _

Unfortunately, the car doors are still very fervently locked, so Jonathan’s got absolutely no means of escape. 

Rather than panicking and throwing something at his abductor like his brain currently appears to  _ want _ him to do, however, Jonathan opts for a slightly more sane approach to the situation, praying to God that he doesn’t have some abnormally petrified expression on his face as he clears his throat and questions articulately:

_ “Hm?”  _

His voice comes out all squeaky and nowhere _ near  _ as innocuous as he’d have liked, but Steve pays it no mind, gaze straying fitfully to the jut of Jonathan’s ankle, which has begun to swell up handsomely  _ (terrific.),  _ instead, and flitting every so often to glance at the grimy blood caking the right side of his face. He then stares right into his passenger’s eyes--a hazy, furrowed look wallowing densely in the chestnut of his own--and Jonathan lets out a feeble, tinny noise of surprise that he’s not all that proud of. 

“Since you insist on being a fucking pussy and refusing to go to the hospital,” he unbuckles his seatbelt in the midst of his explanation, and Jonathan quickly undoes his, too, before Steve can  _ (strangle him with it)  _ attempt to do it for him. 

(He’s  _ eighteen,  _ for fuck’s sake, not  _ five _ . He can take care of himself. He gets that Steve is, like, a  _ mom _ now, but he’s hardly even a year older than him. The guy probably shouldn’t even be helping the  _ kids _ out anymore, really. They’re nearly old enough to drive, after all; surely, they’re old enough to know how to  _ buckle a goddamn seatbelt _ .)

“I’m gonna walk you over to the ole’  _ Casa del Harrington  _ and we’ll see what we can do about your leg.” After a brief wrestle with the handle to get the car door open and with a gestural nod in the direction of Jonathan’s mangled foot, Steve climbs out, and in three swift, deliberate steps, swings open the passenger’s side door of the car as well, staring at the younger man in his seat expectantly. 

There’s a pregnant pause in which Jonathan gawks stupidly up at his friend, blinking absently as it occurs to him that he’s never even seen what Steve’s house looks like from behind, much less actually been  _ inside  _ of it. 

(He supposes, however, that it can’t be much worse than a hospital; at least he won’t get charged a fortune just for stepping up to the doorframe.)

At any rate, with a busted foot and his only access to the outside world blotted out by an obstructive, 6 foot-something, 180 pound figure, Jonathan’s pretty sure he hasn’t got much of a say in the matter. 

“You’re damn right you don’t,” Steve says, and  _ shit.  _

_ He hadn’t realized he’d said that out loud.  _

“Come on,” Steve grumbles with a heaving sigh when Jonathan doesn’t move a muscle, rolling his eyes and huffing a stray wisp of hair out of his face (hair that has, somehow, only seemed to gain volume with time. If Jonathan didn’t know better, he might’ve sworn the thing was a live entity and was exponentially  _ multiplying _ as the years wore on), “I won’t bite.” 

Steve offers him a hand, and Jonathan finds himself reluctantly inclined to accept, considering he doesn’t quite trust his body to remain upright after the stunt it pulled less than fifteen minutes ago. 

(He shudders slightly as the unpredictably _ pleasant _ sensation of Steve Harrington’s arms holding him firmly in place comes surging back to his cells, and he wills away the shivery feeling of an almost blissful obsequiousness settling in his spine by forcing himself to focus on the cold and nothing  _ but  _ the cold all a-fucking-round him-- _ lord _ knows it’s easier than acknowledging the inglorious fact that being the man of the house since he was ten has inexorably taken its toll, and all he wants right here, right now, is to be held by somebody.

Even if that somebody is his girlfriend’s goddamn  _ ex _ .)

He shrugs noncommitally, and locks his fingers around Steve’s wrist. He’ll take what he can get, he supposes. 

“Okay,” he agrees disingenuously, “even though you ought to know that the refusal to bite is, like, a  _ major  _ turn off for me.” 

…

_ What the fuck? _

_ What the fucking fuck?? _

_ What the goddamn living fuck did he just fucking say??? _

There’s a terrorizing matter of seconds in which time is frozen stagnantly in place, and Jonathan regrets every magnanimous instance of his spectacularly shitty life, scrutinizing nihilistically over every stupid screwup, each infinitesimal error, and every reeling occasion of humiliation in the duration of his horrendous existence that has contributed to this particular moment right here. 

It makes him wish he had never been fucking born.

And then Steve straight up  _ cackles _ \--

(It scares him for a moment; he doubles over like he’s having a stroke or something, and lets out a high-pitched, wheezing noise, sounding for all the world like a hysterically dying hyena.)

\--and his shoulders relax, and everything is okay, again. 

“God fucking  _ damn, _ Byers,” Steve forces out in a stammery exhale once he’s finished laughing, making Jonathan flinch (unbeknownst to either of the boys) erratically, “I was  _ not  _ expecting that.” 

Jonathan lets him recover completely before standing with the strain of nearly all his body weight shoved onto the unbalanced support of Steve’s arm, and wobbles precariously, but doesn’t fall. After ensuring that he won’t bring them both toppling clamorously to the ground if he so much as moves an inch in the wrong direction, he nods firmly--mostly to himself--and glances ambivalently at his human crutch. 

Steve, he discovers upon looking up, is still grinning like a complete fucking  _ idiot.  _

Jonathan grumbles gently, tugging at his friend’s sleeve in attempts to remind him that he’s still pretty fucked up, over here, and rolls his eyes. 

_ (He pretends, fruitlessly, that the giddy, lopsided slant of Steve’s smile doesn’t make his stomach flip in the same way Nancy’s laugh does, and he lets Steve help him into the house, deciding that--Yeah, okay.  _

_ This is a whole awful lot better than a hospital.)  _

 

|~~~|

 

The first time Steve had to take care of a broken bone all by his lonesome was when he fell out of a tree at age eight and shattered his wrist while his parents were out somewhere, and, being quite a bit  _ stupider _ than he is now, thought it adequate to remedy the raucously spasming pain unforgivingly skirting his forearm with a couple of haphazardly splayed-on spiderman band-aids. 

Now, however, as a man who is quite a bit older, bolder, and-- _ he’d like to think _ \--gifted with at least the  _ slightest _ bit of common sense, he strides straight to the masterbathroom cabinet, to retrieve the emergency first aid kit that’s been used almost  _ too _ often for comfort these past few years.

He can hear Jonathan shuffling awkwardly on his couch downstairs, and purses his lips, letting a slow trail of steady breaths effuse through his partly-opened mouth. He prays to whoever is up there and might have the decency to be listening that there’s enough gauze in the kit to cover at  _ least _ a minor sprain. Before he closes the cabinet door to return to his patient, however, he pauses, glancing hesitantly at the contents of his parents’ bathroom and giving in with a halfhearted shrug. 

He reaches out and grabs the box of spiderman band-aids, too,  _ just  _ in case. 

“Alright, man,” Steve clambers klutzily down the stairwell and swallows thickly, eyeing briefly the scratched-up part of Jonathan’s face and grimacing to himself. 

_ (It's as good a place to start as any, right?) _

“This might sting a little,” he mumbles, stepping close enough to Jonathan that he can feel the trills of his friend’s breaths hitting his face every few seconds, and crouching slightly at the knees to meet his eyes. 

Fingers slip under the jut of Jonathan’s chin to tilt his face upward. There’s a bit of scruff there, Steve can’t help but notice. His other hand cups the frame of Jonathan’s cheekbone and he angles his face so that the gravelly, bloody part of flesh along his jawline is facing him. 

_ Ladies and Gents, Makeshift Nurse Steve Harrington has entered the building. _

He begins by bringing a moist towelette--one that, to be perfectly honest, has gone a little dry in the span of time it’s taken for him to muster up the courage to actually get some of the grime off of Jonathan’s face--to the bloodiest conglomeration of dirt that’s attached itself disagreeably to the line of Jonathan’s cheek. Once he’s sure he’s peeled off anything that isn’t the raw skin hiding beneath the scrape, he places a dollop of antiseptic cream on the pad of his fingertip and scrubs it as gently as he can into the newly-congealing scab on Jonathan’s face. 

(Not  _ once  _ does it occur to him that maybe Jonathan, as an adult man, is capable of washing dirt off his face on his  _ own _ . At any rate, Jonathan doesn’t stop him--doesn’t do anything but inhale somewhat sharply every now and again, really. So, no harm, no foul, right?

_ Right. _ )

Steve doesn’t even realize that the both of them have been indiscernibly  _ silent _ for practically five whole minutes until he opens his mouth to speak and can find nothing to say.

(Although, this is hardly his fault. It  _ can’t _ be. Jonathan’s  _ eyes  _ are on him, after all, leering vigilantly, staring without even the remotest subtlety at the curvature of his cheek and the tiny bit of tongue protruding from his chapped lips, prudently pressed in concentration. What’s he supposed to say under that sort of scrutiny? What  _ can  _ he say?) 

_ “What?”  _ he asks, alarmed, as he sticks a third bandaid on Jonathan’s jaw, this one depicting red and blue webbing strung between Peter Parker’s gloved fingers. 

Jonathan just blinks, taken aback for a moment, and then smiles and shakes his head dismissively. 

“S’nothing,” he says, and Steve notices just how close their faces are in proximity to one another, unconsciously taking a step back, but letting his fingers linger on the plane of Jonathan’s cheek.

(He shrugs the foreignness of it all it off. He’s good at that.)

“Whatever,” he mutters, and he means it.

(He  _ does. _ ) 

He sits then on his knees, pulls off Jonathan’s ratty old sneaker, and begins to unravel the gauze.

That’s when Jonathan clears his throat, coughing obtrusively, and makes him look up sharply to gaze directly into his eyes. 

(Looking right into them is like an  _ attack,  _ Steve thinks idly to himself.  _ A fucking death wish.  _ They’re so intense, all the damn time. So fucking  _ pretty _ . Who the hell has the right to have eyes like _ that? _ He feels ensnared. Feels surrounded. Feels enveloped. Feels confined.

He feels trapped.

And, for some reason, he doesn’t hate it.)

“Do you think it’s broken?” 

Jonathan snaps him almost invasively out of his stupor by kicking his hurt foot emphatically, scowling. Steve starts, forgetting for a moment what he was doing, and wonders briefly if Jonathan would ever consider a career as a hypnotist. 

He shakes the thought, and instead takes a steady hold of Jonathan’s ankle, gluing his own eyes to the injury and pretending he doesn’t feel Jonathan’s boring into the top of his head.

“It’s mostly just swollen, I think,” he says slowly, ambivalently, perhaps unreasonably proud of his voice for not quivering mid-sentence. He still doesn’t look up at his friend. “There’s no open cut or anything, so I doubt it’ll get infected.”

Steve pokes at the jutting joint of Jonathan’s foot curiously, flinching back when the latter hisses in pain. 

“Sorry,” he murmurs, and glances up fleetingly to make sure he’s alright.

“You’re good,” Jonathan assures, biting at his lip, and Steve thinks this might be the most solemn conversation he’s had in months. 

He’s tempted to crack a joke of some sort, to lighten the mood, but thinks better of it. Maybe next time.

_ (Next time? What next time?)  _

Instead, he sets forth on what he was aiming to do in the first place, steadying Jonathan’s leg from the shin down so it stays in place and ripping the bandage he’s prepared apart from the roll of gauze with his teeth. 

“Sanitary,” Jonathan remarks with a slight smirk, and Steve slaps his knee and quips back swiftly.

“You’re the one that was too good for a hospital,  _ asshole _ ,” he says, making Jonathan laugh lightly and airily, a ghost of a grin etched pleasantly on his lips even once he’s fallen quiet again.

(Some of the tension dissolves, then, Steve thinks, which is good. At the same time, he’s not exactly sure how the tension even  _ got  _ there, to begin with, which doesn’t really make sense. He grimaces inwardly, and wonders if this is a triviality that’ll remain between the two of them for the rest of their lives: a consequence of trying to bond with the guy who’s now boning your ex-girlfriend.)

The bandage tears fairly easily, and Steve begins to wrap it firmly around Jonathan’s foot to keep it from twisting further. Jonathan winces some, but otherwise does nothing but stare.

(For some reason, though, he’s sure that’s not it. In fact, he hasn’t thought about Nancy  _ once  _ in the past hour, which, even after two goddamn years, he’s pretty sure is a new record for him.)

His tongue is sticking out again, and he can feel his fingers fidgeting slightly. He knows Jonathan sees it, too. He can feel him staring at him. Can feel him being his awfully attentive self. He wonders if there’s ever been anything about him (or anyone else at all, really) that Jonathan hasn’t noticed. The thought that the guy probably knows more about him that his own parents do makes Steve a little queasy.

(He’s thinking about her  _ now _ , though. But he’s thinking about Jonathan, too. He’s thinking about how her hugs feel--how her hugs  _ used  _ to feel--and about how nice it must be for Jonathan to get to hug her whenever he pleases. There’s no inherent envy in the thought--in fact, it feels almost warm. Almost comfortable. Almost  _ right.  _

Looking back, he finds himself imagining  _ this  _ to be the first solid instance of his subconscious realization that he doesn’t  _ want _ to take Jonathan’s place in the picture perfect portrayal of Nancy’s life; he just wants to  _ be _ there, with them. With the  _ both _ of them.

He wants something unhindered by the fact that Jonathan’s dating his ex, or vice versa. He wants something unaffected by the unspoken rule that exes can’t be friends. He wants something  _ stable  _ and  _ real  _ with perhaps the only two people his age who are still willing to  _ be _ his friends.

He wants--)

_ “Done,”  _ he announces a bit too loudly, if the startled jump Jonathan gives as a reaction is any indication. 

He blinks down at him, and runs a hand awkwardly through his hair. “Uhh,  _ okay _ .”

Jonathan begins to stand, gingerly stepping onto his bandaged foot and instinctively placing a hand on Steve’s shoulder to steady himself. 

On reflex, Steve jerks upwards and clasps his hand over Jonathan’s to keep it from shaking, offering a dissonant grin of sorts. 

“ _ Woah,  _ okay, that’s, uh--” he pauses, raising an eyebrow and squeezing Jonathan’s hand, “a good way to break your leg for  _ real _ , Byers.” 

Jonathan glares at him, wearing a small smile, and  _ sticks out his tongue _ , like any normal, mature eighteen-year-old man would do in a situation such as this.

Steve finds himself unable to  _ not  _ laugh at that and lets his arm sling all the way around Jonathan’s broad shoulders, ducking his head and chuckling warmly.

“Put that the fuck back,” he snickers, blowing the hair out of his face, “you are  _ so late  _ to get home, your mom is actually going to slaughter me.” 

Jonathan finds a comfortable balance of sorts without straining his leg too badly and, for some reason, doesn’t throw Steve’s lanky form off his back. 

“You’re not wrong,” he muses softly, “she’s probably already sent out a search and rescue team and contacted every known citizen of Indiana looking for me.” 

“Well  _ shit, _ ” Steve says smartly, and they exchange a quick glance which disperses promptly and effortlessly into a fit of giggles that are in no manner apt to be shared between two men.

(And Steve  _ knows _ it.) 

He helps Jonathan back into the passenger’s seat of his car, even though he knows full well that he could probably manage to get in perfectly adequately on his own. He shoots Jonathan a genuine, broad grin before shutting the door and starting the engine, even though there’s no real reason for it. He picks an eyelash gently off the plane of Jonathan’s cheek on the ride over, even though he’s driving and knows damn well how dangerous a stunt like that could be. 

(He  _ knows _ , but he does it all anyway.

Because, while he may be quite a bit less stupid than he was when he decided to put all his weight upon a branch of the tree in his backyard that was so thin, birds wouldn’t even nest in it, Steve Harrington is still  _ very much _ prone to crash and burn at any given moment.)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Plot? I don't know her. Have some needless gay garbage instead.
> 
> AS USUAL, THANK YOU SM FOR READING HOLY SHIT I CANT BELIEVE YALL LIKE THIS  
> LEAVE ME A COMMENT CUZ IM A FUCKIN SLUT FOR ATTENTION FROM STRANGERS THX


	6. I Think Everyone's Out To Get Me, And I Think Maybe I Deserve It

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Mike’s smiles are loud. That's just a fact. They're loud and unapologetic and belligerent. They’re loud, and contagious, and addictive, which makes sense, because so is he.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> HOLY SHIT I'M ALIVE???!?!   
> (fuckin unfortunately lmao)
> 
> Anyway have this shit because apparently it takes me six fucking chapters to get through one fictitious day.

“Hyperbolic language is disgusting and ought to be banned.” 

El declares this with an emphatic solemnity in her voice, and when Dustin looks up from his spot on the floor, her expression bears a frightening resemblance to that of a particularly peeved Jim Hopper, which is pretty unprecedented, since they’re not actually biologically related  _ at all _ .

“Banned...from  _ what,  _ exactly?” Lucas queries, rolling over onto his side and pushing his reading glasses further up his nose in an awfully pretentious manner he’s picked up from  _ God knows where _ , blinking at the girl sitting crosslegged on her soft pink sheets and looking positively  _ infuriated _ .

“From  _ everything!”  _ Eleven says earnestly, flopping onto her stomach suddenly and clutching a big, puffy pillow to her chin for emphasis, her eyebrows knitted so closely together, they seem to have merged into one single, fuzzy entity. 

Dustin snorts insolently at the thought of Jane Hopper sporting a unibrow, while the girl in question goes on to further clarify her indignation regarding the self-acclaimed literary foundation known as,  _ A Tale of Two Cities.  _

_ (“It’s not even actually  _ about  _ the two cities! The whole thing’s one big fucking lie!”)  _

Mike smiles warmly at no one in particular as her voice rises a good octave or two, the way it tends to fluctuate whenever she gets substantially agitated about anything, be the object of her discomposure the excessive length of the lunchline at school or the outrageous lack of waffle options at the nearby IHOP-

_ (“And these assholes have the  _ audacity  _ to call themselves a  _ breakfast _ place…”) _

-or, as the case often is, the unfairness and inherent incredulity of the English language. 

“What were you expecting, El?” Mike interrupts her in the midst of her thorough critique of Lucie Manette’s “almost inhuman dullness”. He still looks somewhat lofty and dazed, making Dustin ponder for a brief moment whether his friend might actually be  _ stoned _ (before recalling that all five of them slept over at the Hoppers’ last night, and there is no way in  _ hell _ that awkward, gangly Mike escaped a room decked wall to wall with sleeping bags containing sprawl-limbed, lanky teenagers in the middle of the night to get high without anyone noticing). “Idiomatic imagery and all that is sort of Chuck Dickie’s  _ thing. _ ”

...

A beat. A moment of silence, a calm before the storm, and then an inexorable clamor. 

Will registers it a split second before anyone else gets the chance, and the pencil he was using to scribble annotations into his book falls to the floor with a clatter. From the opposite side of the bed, he pipes up. 

“What the  _ fuck  _ did you just call Charles Dickens?”

Mike full on  _ smirks _ \--sitting up and shaking the hair out of his eyes like a victoriously placated dog--and fucking  _ winks  _ at him.

“You heard me,” he says, voice lilted with a cheeky inflection that seems to  _ dare  _ somebody to challenge him.

Will looks affronted, eyes blown wide and eyebrows furrowed distastefully, stunned and mortified and a little revolted with the boy he’s chosen to call his best friend. Dustin watches his face switch through about fifty incredulous expressions in less than five seconds, and fights the urge to laugh as he mouths quietly:

_ “You’ve gotta be fucking shitting me.” _

He sounds altogether  _ tortured _ , and the fact that Mike has managed to maintain a completely stoical countenance this entire time is absolutely astonishing.

The boy--who, it appears, is in fact  _ not  _ shitting him--looks up, more smug than anyone who has just said the words  _ “Chuck Dickie”  _ has any justifiable right to be, as though he’s accomplished something extraordinary, and it’s at that godawful moment that Max absolutely  _ loses  _ it. 

She lets her head fall limp so that curtains of hair drape over her face and starts honest-to-god  _ vibrating,  _ silently shaking about the shoulders, and for a second, Dustin’s scared she might be having some sort of stroke. 

But then she lets out an otherworldly  _ shriek _ that, as someone who’s known her for nearly three years, is effortlessly recognizable as a laugh, and his unprecedentedly tensed shoulders relax, ever so slightly.

(The hairs still standing attentively up on his arms and neck don’t seem to have received the memo that everything’s fine, though, because they refuse to go back down. Or maybe they were just scared shitless by Max’s wounded pterodactyl screech. Either way, the goosebumps that have seized reign of his body don’t seem like they’ll be leaving him be anytime soon. 

It’s hard to understand exactly  _ why _ he used to be so haplessly devastated over this girl, sometimes.)

She picks herself up, eyes screwed triumphantly shut as she continues to snicker, and tugs a crumpled Abraham Lincoln out of the topmost pocket of her too-large jeans jacket, blinking away genuine  _ tears  _ as she hobbles her way across the room and drops the five dollar bill on top of Mike’s head. 

“Oh my god, that was  _ beautiful, _ ” she announces proudly, hands clasped on her knees to keep herself from doubling over after having giggled her  _ guts  _ out, Dustin is sure. “Totally worth it. One hundred percent.  _ Shit,  _ this is the happiest I’ve been in my  _ life. _ ”

Mike pockets the money and grins ludicrously, allotting a couple of gruff chuckles of his own to escape from his lips, and Dustin is too busy glancing back and forth between the two perpetrators of the intermittent transaction and wondering what the  _ hell  _ just happened to notice how Will’s face grows about thirty-six shades redder as he does his best not to gawk at his friend’s smile. 

_ (Eleven, however, is sitting right next to the skinny little loser, and quite silently watches him as he watches Mike, any frustration she may have held surrounding Chuck Dickie’s writing being promptly forgotten, or at least momentarily dismissed. As it just so happens, she’s spent enough time around these dweebs to know exactly what it means when the color of Will’s face transforms into that of an overripe tomato’s. _

_ She smiles to herself, feeling covert, and feeling important. Knowing that she knows something no one’s supposed to know.) _

Lucas speaks up for the first time since his earlier question unintentionally triggered a JaneTrain--the gang’s unofficially trademarked term for any item of opinion that, once Jane’s started talking about it, is bound to be all they’re allowed to discuss for at least a couple of hours, if not days--and raises an eyebrow at his girlfriend. 

_ “That’s  _ the happiest you’ve ever been?” he asks, shaking his head disdainfully, “ _ God _ , that’s a little sad.”

The remark earns him a fluid flick of the bird from Max, and he smiles slightly. 

“No one  _ asked  _ you,” she retorts, sticking out her tongue and plopping back down onto the floor beside Dustin, who takes the opportunity to stretch his feet over and into her lap. El makes a confused noise and swings her own legs over the side of the bed, facing away from Will to squint incomprehensibly at Max.

“Did you just  _ pay  _ Mike for saying something stupid? That’s such a terrible waste of money!” 

She glances about as Dustin suddenly breaks out in a chorus of cackling guffaws, his braying laughter unbridled and unashamed as his curls flop over his forehead and he wipes nonexistent tears from his eyes. Over where he’s sitting, Mike’s trying his damndest to look at least a little offended, but El can see the smile threatening to breach the unfractured line of his lips. Behind her, Will is also snickering as inconspicuously as he possibly can into his cupped hands, trying to muffle the loud snorts that sometimes accompany the sound of his laugh out of force of habit, even though everyone in the room has had plenty of time to grow accustomed to them. 

“You’re gonna be broke before the end of the year, I hope you know,” she tells Max, pursing her lips scornfully and going back to her work. Next to her, Will’s face is buried in the pages of his book, his spine-shuddering laughter reverberating in his hands as he chuckles into  _ The Shoemaker.  _ Lucas is grinning at him; there’s always something inexplicably refreshing about watching Will Byers laugh, something that makes you feel like, somehow, all the shit in your life is gonna be worth it someday.

(There's something about Will Byers  _ in general _ , El thinks, that makes you feel like that. Like you're powerful enough to make the world bow down at your feet if you want it to, but good enough to  _ not _ want it to. 

Will Byers makes you  _ wanna _ be good enough to not want it to.)

Mike sticks his tongue out at Jane, beaming brightly enough to challenge even the glare of the sun on a particularly scorching August morning--

(Mike’s smiles are a lot  _ louder  _ than Will’s. Louder than anyone El has ever met before in her entire life, actually. His smiles command your attention in a way that makes you willingly want to give it to him, are broad and boisterous and messy and oh so  _ Mike,  _ and yet somehow still keen and coy and genuine and special. 

They’re contagious, and addictive, which makes sense, because so is he.)

\--and shakes the hair that has fallen into his florid features out of his eyes, giving the Bronx cheer and looking for all the world like an overgrown toddler. 

“Fuck you, El,” he says affectionately, “I'm a goddamn  _ genius _ and you all know it.”

Lucas mutters something under his breath that Dustin can’t hear, and Eleven throws the nearest pillow--a flouncy, heart shaped one she tends to toss off the bed when she’s actually asleep--at Mike’s head. Max slumps onto her boyfriend’s chest, and rolls her eyes as melodramatically as she can in Will’s direction. The latter sighs back and sets down his book, having known since the minute he arrived that there was no way in  _ hell _ he was gonna get any actual work done around the rest of these geeks.

They leave not too long after that, Ms. Henderson arriving, as per usual, at their designated pick-up-time on the dot, and Mrs. Wheeler, unsurprisingly, being fashionably late. Before they go, Mike reminds each of them not to be tardy to their campaign tomorrow at Will’s, and they bid one another farewell until the next day. 

None of them know it at the time, but after that campaign, the six of them won’t be in the same room all at the same time again for the rest of the year. 

 

|~~~|

 

By the time Steve pulls his dinky douchebag car into the Byers’ driveway, it’s well past seven, and Jonathan is fully expecting a quarrelsome earful of  _ “where the hell have you been?!” _ s and a hearty helping of  _ “you are in big, big trouble, young man!” _ s the second Joyce sees him, so you can imagine his surprise when he plows into the house--practically knocking the door down off its hinges as he barrels frantically inside--and discovers dinner only  _ just being served,  _ his kid brother slouching in his seat at the table with his chin held in one of his palms, his food as untouched as the blank expression sitting on his features, and his other hand confined in a plaster cast. 

Jonathan freezes in place, and the  _ bleep  _ of Steve’s car being locked suddenly seems very far away.

His mother places the bowl of potato salad she’s got cradled in her arms on the table and turns to face her elder son, wearing a tired, wearily apologetic smile: the cumbersome kind that’s sure to crack the moment no one’s looking. 

“Hey, honey!” she says with all the practiced tenacity of a mother stretched so thin, she’s about to tear apart, “sorry for whatever massive screw up I might’ve caused earlier. I called Karen to tell you that dinner was gonna be a little later tonight.  _ Completely  _ forgot that she’s not allowed to know about you and Nancy.” 

She pantomimes thunking her head with a _doy!_ sort of expression, and Jonathan lets his lips curl into a small, barely noticeable frown. _Of course_ his mom decided to call Mrs. Wheeler the moment Nancy said she...well…; _of_ _course_ he’d nearly broken his leg jumping out of _a window_ for no reason at all. 

_ Of fucking course.  _

He nearly forgets that Steve is still there until he collides with his back and sends him toppling over for the umpteenth time that day. He catches him before he can slip completely, though, reflexes faster than Jonathan had expected, by gripping him tightly round the arm and tugging him back upright.

“Dude,” he deadpans, relinquishing the limb he’s taken captive once he’s sure Jonathan’s sustained the ability to stay on his  _ fucking _ feet, “what are you doing  _ in the doorway? _ ”

Jonathan says nothing, but his gaze shifts back to Will and his plastered hand. Steve follows his eyes, doubling back when his own stare lands on the mildly surprised but otherwise entirely uninterested-looking kid he saw only days prior, now appearing as though he’s aged a hundred years and hasn’t slept right in weeks. 

He opens his mouth, presumably to make a remark of some sort, but is briskly interjected by the exaggeratedly delighted quip of Joyce’s voice.

“Steve! It's so lovely to see you, sweetie. How've you been?”  

Steve blinks at her, and by the time he’s registered her pleasantries and is disorientedly preparing to respond, an addendum of a fourth plate has already been made to the Byers’ dinner table setting. 

“You’ll join us for dinner, won’t you?” 

_ Shit.  _

Steve’s eyes widen as he goes stock still, wracking his brain for some sort of excuse that’ll get him out of having to sit awkwardly and eat with a family that’s not even his and clearly has its own shit to work out. 

And damn him all to hell, he comes up with  _ nothing.  _

He ends up seated between Will and Jonathan, shoulders tensed and eyes unblinking, gaze shifting trepidatiously between his sort-of friend and the boy he’s seen dead more times than he’d like to think about. On occasion, his glance meets that of Mrs. Byers, and he’s forced immediately to turn away, unable to look the warrior of a woman in the eye for fear of letting slip the elusive something that he himself hasn’t quite figured out yet. 

_ (Something that he hasn’t quite  _ let  _ himself figure out, yet). _

Dinner is quiet. Dead silent. Joyce doesn’t ask about Jonathan’s ankle or battered face. Jonathan doesn’t question Will’s busted hand. Steve focuses adamantly on his food so that no one dares make an effort to speak to him, and fleetingly humors the ludicrous thought that the Byers might not be real, actual human beings (the kind that generally tend to make  _ noise _ when gathered around a table). 

About halfway through the meal, Will gets to his feet and mutters something about being excused.

He’s out of the kitchen before Joyce can make any attempt to respond to the request that, in all honesty, didn’t really sound like the kid was asking for permission. 

His plate looks virtually untouched, save for some frivolous fidgeting. 

His eyes are downcast and his hair falls in unkempt wisps into them as he sulks briskly away. 

There’s the shallow thud of a door shutting once he’s gone, and then nothing. 

And, as Steve pardons himself to the toilet and slinks quietly towards the youngest Byers’s bedroom, he wonders how in the hell _this_ stupid situation became _his_ headache. 

He shoulders the door open, knowing full well that knocking will only give the kid a better chance to lock him out and close off further, and damn him if he's about to let Will Byers  _ “I'm okay”  _ his way out of this one. 

Not after that little display at dinner.

Steve’s never seen Joyce  _ so quiet  _ before. 

(Well, actually, that's a lie. He's seen her that quiet before. He's seen her that helpless before. Seen her that desperate and detached and frazzled before. 

He knows Joyce Byers. Knows her better than his own mother. Knows how strong she is. Knows how resolute she is. 

Knows how hard it is to fuck her up this badly.)

Will is flat on his back--in his bed, staring statically up at the ceiling as if praying for it to cave in on him--when Steve makes an entrance. To the nineteen-year-old’s surprise, the boy barely even reacts as he barges in on his solitary moping, gaze flitting lazily over to the intruder and raising one eyebrow uncertainly in his direction, but otherwise remaining perfectly motionless and silent. Not at all how Steve remembers acting when he himself was fifteen and someone had decided to walk into his room without his permission. 

It’s a little unnerving to see Will this apathetic. 

_ (It’s almost like…)  _

He derails that train of thought before anybody can board, and walks over to plop onto the side of the teenager’s bed. Vaguely, he registers the cavity torn in the wooden wall on the opposite side of the room, splinters rendered indiscriminately every which way, a hollow dent collapsed inward on itself with off-colored strips of paint peeling away from it where the impact hit. He pays it no mind. This house has been through all sorts of shit, after all, and he’s got bigger fish to fry. 

Much bigger fish. Immense, carnivorous fish. Sharks, really. Massive, caged, murderous sharks that this kid is about to set free with one single question.

It’s Will who speaks first, because Steve, bless his stupid senseless heart, walked right into this without a game plan, and is now sitting stupefied on his friend’s kid brother’s bed. 

_ Terrific. _

Fortunately, Will Byers has got enough shit plaguing his restless mind to make up for a whole roomfull of questionably qualified dad friends. And he’s too scared to give said shit an outlet--not after what happened earlier. 

So instead, he asks an altogether ambiguous, if somewhat perturbing, innocent question. A childish one. One he’s asked multitudes of people with varying resulting responses, some more honest than others. 

He asks this: 

“What would you think of me if you met me for the first time today?” 

It’s a loaded question, without a doubt. One Steve’s not sure he’s equipped to answer. 

Fortunately, he isn’t given the opportunity. 

“I think, if  _ I  _ met me today, I’d fucking  _ hate  _ me.” 

Steve swivels, opening his mouth with a rebuttal ready on his lips, and notices for the first time that Will isn’t facing him. Not in the slightest. 

He’s looking instead at the wall to his left, picking at the cast on his hand. 

He’s talking to himself. 

And that’s when Steve recognizes (not for the first time) what a fucking idiot he is. Recognizes the futility and sheer stupidity of coming in here in the first place. 

He’s not gonna be able to help with  _ this,  _ whatever  _ this  _ is. Joyce couldn’t. Jonathan didn’t even  _ try.  _ Who the hell is  _ he  _ to come in and tell this fucked up freakshow of a fifteen year old it’s all gonna be okay? 

He’s Steve Harrington. He’s Steve Harrington who was too stupid to get into college right after graduating like all the normal idiots in the world, whose only friends are a couple of highschool sophomores, his ex, and his ex’s  _ new boyfriend,  _ whose only real merit lies in the fact that he’s a kickass babysitter, and who’s never actually done anything right in his goddamn life. 

He has no business here. 

So, Steve picks himself up and prepares to leave, considers momentarily some sort of exit speech, but thinks better of it, and gets halfway to the door when--

“Steve?” 

The volume of the one word is lost in the stifling heaviness of the air, and what’s left to be audibly heard is muffled by the pillow cushioned to his mouth. He’s still staring adamantly at the wall, because, apparently, the ceiling wasn’t doing him any good. 

But Steve hears it. Somehow, he hears it. 

“What’s up?” he replies, and then cringes, because  _ really? ‘What’s up’???  _

What a shitty fucking decision. 

_ (Just like pretty much every other one he’s ever made in his pitiful, lackluster life.)  _

It’s enough for Will, it seems, because,  _ finally,  _ the kid turns around.

(Steve tries not to inhale too sharply at how  _ familiarly dead  _ he looks.) 

Will blinks, sits up only barely, and opens his mouth, clearing his throat and looking  _ right at  _ the man stood a few feet in front of him.

He opens his mouth, and all hell breaks loose. 

“Is there anything about you that you wanna, like,  _ change _ , but you just...you just  _ can’t? _ ” 

And suddenly, Steve notices the hole in the wall, and the papers scrambled around on Will’s desk, and the crumpled-up sketches thrown hastily into the trashcan, and the cheap, prying notebook shoved partially under the bed. 

And suddenly, Steve’s eyes are forced wide fucking open, and no matter how hard he tries, no matter how  _ badly  _ he wants to go back, he just can’t seem to  _ get them shut.  _

 

|~~~|

 

(There’s something that’s been bothering Jonathan since the minute he got back. Something more than Will’s fractured hand and broken attitude, something more than his mom’s fake smiles and quivery lips. 

Something he can’t quite put his finger on. 

Something that’s  _ driving him insane.  _

And it isn’t until late late  _ late  _ that night--2:18 a.m., to be exact; hours after Steve’s headed home and his family’s crept off to bed--that he realizes  _ exactly _ what that something is.

It’s while he’s drifting ambivalently about in that subliminal state of half-sleep, when you’re kinda dreaming, and kinda not. Something yellow flashes in his slumbering subconscious, and it’s the last piece of dreamworld he gets before his eyes blow wide open. 

It’s the last piece of dreamworld he gets before he realizes that  _ holy shit.  _

_ Steve picked him up from the Wheelers’ under the guise that Joyce had sent him to fetch her son for dinner. _

_ But dinner was  _ late. 

_ Joyce had called Karen Wheeler to let Jonathan know that she was being held up at the E.R.  _

_ Which meant… _

Steve hadn’t been under his mother’s occupation when came to pick up Jonathan. 

Steve hadn’t been sent to get him by anybody. 

_ Steve hadn’t been in any way, shape, or form responsible for him that afternoon.  _

So what the  _ fuck  _ had Steve been doing when he nearly ran him over with his car?)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey hey hey so this took WAY too fucking long and now that it's out, I'd like to formally apologize for this chapter being absOLUTE SHIT but it's been a WOOOO rough month for ya boi here hA and this became a run-on sentence twelve fucking words ago so Imma end it here.
> 
> Fr though, I am sorry it took so long, hopefully the hiatus won't be so hellish next time but I am still busting my ass over APs so,,,
> 
> THE NEXT CHAPTER IS ALREADY STARTED THO SO LIKE. UNLESS I FUCK UP MAJORLY IT SHOULD TAKE LESS DISGUSTINGLY LONG TO WRITE.   
> (I can already taste myself eating my words fucking five months from now lmao)
> 
> Anyway, comment, it's my one (1) will to live


	7. I Think I May Be Wrong

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> She’s so far away. She will always be so very far away.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> HOLYYYYYY SHIIIIT  
> That took,,, longer than expected.  
> BUT IT'S HERE!!! I DID IT!!!!!  
> /ouef/  
> I'm so sorry y'all it's just been a fuckin Time   
> Junior year is just,,, gross,,,,,,  
> Enjoy, hopefully.  
> (Sorry. Again.)

There’s church on Sundays. Everybody knows that. At the beginning of each week in Hawkins, if you wake up early enough, you can see at least half the town trudging in a zombified, half-asleep horde to the only church around for miles and miles. And Max’s mom insists that they go every damn time, in spite of the redundancy of the task and in spite of the fact that her new family doesn’t care all that much for the piety she seems to sustain. 

Max deals with it,  _ honors  _ it, attends every week without complaint, no matter how boring and dreary and repetitive the mass may get, for a threefold of reasons. 

Reason number 1: Her mother is the only real family she’s got left. It’s her obligation to put aside any resentment she might harbor towards her for uprooting her life and moving her away to Hawkins and uphold the Mayfield family tradition of strictly scheduled worship.

Reason number 2: The longer she gets to stay away from her own house, the longer she gets to stay away from Neil and Billy, and that’s really the best possible outcome of the given familial situation for all three of them. 

And Reason number 3: Her father was a religious man. He believed in the word of God and lived unabashedly by his rules. Going to church reminds Max of him, and, if she closes her eyes and dwells only on the words of the priest, she can almost see him whispering the verses of Matthew silently alongside her. 

So, yeah, Max goes to church. And, most of the time, she has no qualms about it. 

But today? 

Today, walking into that dingy, quaint little cottage of candles that are surely a tremendous fire hazard--the very same one she’s entered so many innumerable times before--feels like stepping into a gutted-out sinkhole filled to the brim with quicksand. Like stepping out onto a minefield of explosives you can see, but can’t avoid no matter how hard you coax your feet to walk in the opposite direction.

It feels  _ icky.  _ Impure. Tainted. Like she doesn’t belong. Like she’s withholding some terrible truth from Him our Lord and the Holy Father can see right through her, could suck the secret right out of her brains if he glared at her hard enough.

_ (It makes her feel like a sinner.) _

And now, because of it, Max can’t get to sleep.

Her pillow is too hot, her room too stuffy, her mattress too lumpy. The braids in her hair tug teasingly at her scalp, and, for the life of her, she can’t contort her excessively long body into any position that’s not depravedly uncomfortable. She grimaces, and turns over in the too-small twin bed she’s owned since she was eight, and tries to make her mind stop racing. 

_ Your best friend’s a Homo,  _ her brain hisses at her uncooperatively, and she almost screams out loud because at least then the noise will make it  _ shut the fuck up _ . 

She tries not to care. 

She tries to fall asleep. 

Both endeavors end in about the same levels of success.

It’s like her eyes have been stapled open. 

And, even though her window’s cracked ajar, and it’s the middle of fucking December, she feels like she’s  _ burning.  _

_ (Burning. That’s what her pastor says will happen to her if she strays from the path of God. What will happen to her if she does something that Jesus wouldn’t. _

_ … _

Jesus probably wouldn’t befriend a goddamn  _ Fagola.)  _

She turns again. And again. And again and again and again. It doesn’t seem to help. She’s still drowning in a myriad of mild discomforts. She’s still painstakingly wide awake. Her mind is still spinning, going numb and flaring up again in agitated cycles. 

Everything feels somehow too bright to sleep through, even though it’s probably  _ midnight  _ by now--

_ (Bright. She might as well get used to that. The lights don’t ever shut off where  _ she’s  _ going.) _

\--and her room faces away from the moon, which she knows all too well, for all the times she’s tried desperately to get a glimpse of it from her windowpane while Neil and her mother were fighting and imagine her dad looking at the same one from wherever he might be.

_ (Her dad, who used to read passages of Exodus and Leviticus aloud to her when she was little and restless and needed to be  _ _~~bored~~ _ _ lulled to sleep. Her dad, who is surely going to Heaven to rest in beds laid of feather and gold. _

_ Her dad, who she won’t be able to see again even Then, because she’ll be too busy burning in her itchy, closed-off cot in Hell, with the words QUEER SYMPATHIZER branded across her face.) _

The curtains in her room are all patched and tattered and ugly. She hates them. She hates them with all her heart. But at least when she forces herself to focus on them, she doesn’t have to listen to the yelling in her head. At least when she forces herself to stare at their ugly dijon mustard-colored ruffles, the screaming strung with last straws all around her grows somewhat muted.

Max is so tired.

She just wants to sleep. 

_ (But. The Books of Exodus and Leviticus were written in the Old Testament. Jesus came to the humans  _ after  _ all that. And, if the Old Testament had been completely perfect, God wouldn’t have sent his son down to the pitfalls of Earth to revise it, right? Right??)  _

She shuts her eyes, and does her best to keep them closed this time around.

_ (And didn’t Jesus say that it was most important for his followers to love each other? To love everybody? Even the sinners? Didn’t Jesus forgive the Romans after what they did? _

_...  _

_ Could she be absolutely sure that Jesus would never ever  _ ever  _ befriend one of Them?) _

In her head, Max sees the archangels scattered around in her shitty little room. She sees Michael perched up on her dresser, and he’s smiling down at Gabriel, who’s at the foot of her armoire. She sees Raphael at her desk, sharing a chair with Raguel, and they’re cramped together but they don’t look at all squished or uncomfortable. She sees Selaphiel next to her bed, with his head in Uriel’s lap and his feet on Barachiel’s thighs. 

She thinks of the angels, and she thinks of her dad, who wouldn’t really be seeing the same moon as her even if he did happen to look up at the sky right now, since the sun’s only just now setting along the Pacific coast of Cali. 

(She’s so far away. She will always be so very far away.) 

She thinks of the angels, and she thinks of Will--of Will and his shy-ish smiles and his softspoken sardonicism and his snarky sweetness--and she thinks of the shitty hand he’s been dealt in his fifteen-year-lifespan. She thinks of how damningly  _ good  _ he is. Of how he’s made this horrible, crusty town feel like something of a home. 

And, as she finally drifts off, Max finds it hard to believe that God could be all that angry at her for loving him the way she does. She thinks--she dares belligerently to believe--that Jesus can forgive  _ her _ for sinning, too. 

_ (2 Kings 2:2--As surely as the Lord lives and as you live, I will not leave you.)  _

 

|~~~|

 

Nancy and Steve never really went out on dates. 

In the year they had been together, life had proven too hectic and dire to squander precious efforts of time and energy on such superficial outings. They had both found themselves entirely more occupied by the increasingly tedious task of staying  _ alive  _ than that of being romantically apt. The closest thing they ever got to a real life date was that one dreadful, heinous evening at the Harringtons during which Barb had gotten killed while they... _ fondued _ . When he thinks too hard about it, Steve is astounded that Nancy didn’t dump his sorry ass sooner. 

So he doesn’t think about it. 

Instead, he lingers on fanciful  _ what-ifs _ that, if executed, would’ve _ never  _ worked in the immaculate fashion with which they tend to play out in his head, but _ hey _ . 

A guy can dream, can’t he? 

...

He wishes he’d taken her out for real. Just the two of them, just once. No otherworldly monsters involved, nor the intrusive behaviors of her brother and his pesky friends to worry about. Just them. Him and Nancy Wheeler, and nothing else.

In short, he wishes he’d been a boyfriend for her. A real one. 

(It’s too late for wishes, now.) 

By the time he gets back to his house after dining  _ (if it could really be called that)  _ at the Byers, it’s nearing midnight. 

(Which, in all honesty, doesn’t very much matter. He’s not going to get a wink of sleep, anyway. Not tonight. Maybe not for the rest of his life. He’ll be too haunted, too cursed by the perpetually ringing words of that troubled little brat hovering heavily over his thoughts, to get any semblance of rest. 

_ Is there anything about you that you wish you could change, but you just can’t?) _

And the answer--the most simply put, straightforward, nonconvoluted answer to that question is  _ of fucking course  _ he does _.  _

Steve wishes he could change a lot of things. Wishes he was better at math and didn’t have to retake pre-calc  _ twice.  _ Wishes his hair wasn’t inevitably tangled up in an absolute abomination when he woke up every morning, wishes that he didn’t have to tame it down with half a bottle of hair gel each damned day just so it wouldn’t look as though a stray animal had died on top of his head.

_ (Wishes he could stop loving Nancy Wheeler as easily as she had stopped loving him.) _

He wishes he had the balls to do what he wanted-- _ needed _ \--to do, to say what he needed to say, without caring about what everyone else thought of it.

But he doesn’t. He probably never will. 

He’s a hollowed-out shell of a poorly stitched-up boy whose stuffing was taken out and whose fleshy, limp body was refilled with egregious insecurities and scandalous secrets. 

_ (His mind decides, for some reason, as he pulls off his shirt and kicks off his shoes and crawls into his unmade bed, to pull up the image of Jonathan’s face going florid earlier that evening when his bandaid-laden fingers got too close to it.  _

_ Lord knows why. _

_ Steve chalks the stray thought of his friend up to fatigue and stress, of which he’s had more than his fair share in the past couple of weeks alone, and settles into his sheets.) _

He doesn’t bother brushing his teeth because by the time he realizes he’s forgotten the menial, habitual little chore, the cold hardwood floor is just too unappealing when contested by the blankets pulled around him. 

_ (Besides. Who’s gonna admonish him for skipping this one night? His friends? His  _ parents _? _

_ Unlikely.)  _

Steve falls asleep ( _ or at least, tricks himself into believing he has) _ with all the dates he never went on with Nancy Wheeler, all the things he could’ve said to comfort a kid he understood all too much and, at the same time, not at all, all the ways he could’ve made his mom give a damn, all the ways he wanted to made his dad proud, crawling uncomfortably over him, rearing their ugly heads and sneering at his splotchy face and reminding him about what a godawful boyfriend, babysitter, friend, son--

_ (All of the above.) _

\--he’s been. 

_ Is there anything about you that you wish you could change, but you just can’t?  _

( _ Yes _ , is what he had meant to say. Is what he should’ve said. Is what he  _ would’ve  _ said, if he wasn’t such a goddamn coward. 

But he is. And he didn’t.

_ Still, it doesn’t matter what he does or does not say. He can’t run away from the answer. There’s nowhere to hide. He doesn’t fit under his bed anymore. He’s too old to go to Mom and Dad for help. He’s got no friends to turn to.)  _

The answer is an unabashed  _ Yes,  _ no matter how he looks at it. _ Yes, yes of course.  _

_ (He’s afraid it always will be.)  _

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> REAL SHIT COMING SOON I S W E A R  
> (pls don't take my promises at face value lol I'm failing AP Chem so my creative capacity isn't at it's finest right now but I am trying I really am)   
> So,, maybe soon might not be the traditional definition of "soon"  
> But it's coming  
> That you can count on
> 
> In the meantime, drop me some sexy comments so I don't die lmao  
> thank ly


	8. I Think I'm Going Crazy

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> And Will, god bless his poor, palpitating heart, is so caught up in the terror of his own stupefying crush that he fails to recognize what the rest of Hawkins--hell, the rest of the fucking universe--already knows. 
> 
> That Mike loves him more fiercely than he’s ever loved anything.
> 
> Always has. 
> 
> Always will.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is easily the worst chapter yet. Whoops.

Mike has always,  _ always,  _ been wary of declaring any sole person his  _ “best friend.”  _

He finds the term alienating. As a person who once had  _ no  _ friends, the implication that any one of the people he finds himself fortunate enough to call his own is in some arbitrary way better than the others doesn’t sit right with him.  _ All  _ of his friends are the best. Which, he supposes, sounds corny and lame, but.

So what? It’s the truth.  

Nevertheless, anyone who’s known him for more than a day knows good and well that, though unspoken, there exists a universal understanding that Will Byers is Mike’s best friend. Always has been. Always will be. 

Universal, that is, with the exception of two key people, who seem to have been neglected a cc when God sent out the memo: Will Byers and Mike Wheeler.

If you ask Will, he’ll rehearsedly state that Mike Wheeler  _ has _ no best friend, loves each and every one of his pals the very same. If pressed, however, he might concede that Mike’s best friend is Lucas or Dustin, or, in more recent days, El.

_ (On more than one occasion has he made the cumbersome clarification to anyone who would listen: “I’m Mike’s  _ oldest  _ friend. Not his  _ best. _ ”) _

Of course, both Lucas and Dustin--and, in more recent days, El--would call bullshit on this unwarranted claim in a heartbeat; if not explicitly, then with a roll of the eyes or a shared, exasperated glance. They were  _ there _ , you see, when William Byers went missing and left everyone who had ever loved him behind to pick up the pieces that remained in his wake. They were there when Mike began to lose himself the same way he’d lost him, day by day, minute by minute. 

They were there to watch their Paladin fall apart without his Cleric to keep him grounded. 

_ (It takes a lot, after all, to turn a perfectly happy, normal preteen boy into someone who would willingly, unreluctantly throw themselves off a cliff for no good reason. No regular old kid would do that. Not unless he’d lost all hope in anything ever getting better.)  _

And they were there, again, when William Byers was  _ found.  _ When, miraculously he came back from the dead.

And when, in turn, Mike came back from the dead, too. 

So it’s no surprise to them--to anyone in Hawkins, really--that after Will is once again safe and sound and back at home where he should be, it’s Mike who takes up the herald to make sure nothing ever encumbers that safe-and-soundness again. Who sleeps on the floors of bedrooms and hospital rooms or not at all, who answers walkie-talkie calls made at four in the morning after particularly bad nightmares, who becomes like an  _ octopus _ in the way that he clings to his best friend with all his might, daring the Lord himself to try and take him away, sending a message to the whole goddamn  _ world _ that if anyone ever wants to lay a hand on William Byers again, they’ll have to pry him out of Mike’s cold, dead fingers, first. 

And Will, god bless his poor, palpitating heart, is so caught up in the terror of his own stupefying crush that he fails to recognize what the rest of Hawkins--hell, the rest of the fucking  _ universe _ \--already knows. 

That Mike loves him more fiercely than he’s ever loved anything.

Always has. 

Always will.

 

|~~~|

 

“Okay, so just, lift it a  _ liiiiittle _ more, and then-- _ there! _ Perfect!”

El wipes the blood trickling from her nose off on the back of her sweater sleeve as the Chief takes a step back to admire his work. He’s been toiling relentlessly to making his shabby little home a bit more homey for his daughter for years now. Since the day he took her in. Little projects like family crafts and framed photographs now litter every inch of the Hopper residence. 

_ (And, sure, it’s not like El’s had any home of any sort before, and her “room” in the lab was hardly a personable habitat, so, logically, any sort of house, no matter how drab and dull, would be an upgrade for her.  _

_ But she’s not going to complain about Jim’s over-the-top efforts. After all, this is everything she’s ever wanted. Everything she thought she could only ever dream of having.)  _

Currently, Sheriff Hopper is arranging all the photos of Jane and her friends that he owns in a collage on the wall in the downstairs corridor, enlisting her help to reach the bit of plaster  _ just _ below the ceiling where he can’t hammer in the nails without using a footstool.

_ (He knows it’s a fire hazard. He doesn’t care.)  _

Unfortunately, Hopper turns around just in time to see his daughter drying her face with her sweater; he makes a strangled noise of stern fatherly disapproval and grabs her hand quickly to stop her. 

“Jane,  _ no, _ ” he frowns. The girl is gonna be sixteen in three months and she’s still using her sleeves as tissues. “We  _ talked  _ about this.”

Eleven pouts at him--actually, honest-to-god  _ pouts  _ at him--and Hopper can’t keep himself from rolling his eyes. 

“You really think that’s still gonna work on me?” he asks her, and she shrugs in response, eyebrows knitting together unhappily. She still has a terrible habit of getting really pissy whenever things don’t go her way. Jim’ll chalk it up to having lived a full twelve years sentenced to silent complacency, stripped of the human right to decide how her own life was gonna go, poked and prodded and punished as an experiment of science rather than the creation of God that she was. 

(Fuck, Jim really  _ hates _ this town. Surely, there’s no other place in the world that could ever do something like that to a little girl.)

He fixes her with his best Dad stare and lets go of her hand, placing his own on his hips. “Wash it off,” he instructs unrelentingly, and apparently she’s in a good enough mood this morning, because after a second of hesitation, she actually walks over to the sink and does it. 

_ (Thank God.) _

“Can I go to Max’s today?” El asks once she’s washed and subsequently dried off her hands and face.

_ (Once again, on her sweater, but hey! At least water stains are better than blood.) _

Jim hesitates. On one hand, saying no to her whenever it’s in regards to her friends is a major risk, since her personality only seems to get more and more explosive every year and her outbursts, unlike other teenagers’, can prove physically damaging. On the other, he’s not even a little bit comfortable letting his girl go anywhere near the spectacular shitshow that is the Hargrove family residence. 

“Why doesn’t Max just come over here?” he suggests as casually as he can, knowing that if she realizes he’s worried about her, she’ll go over there just to spite him.

El shakes her head. “She can’t. She’s grounded.” 

Jim squints at his daughter suspiciously, sitting down at the table and raising an eyebrow. “But she’s allowed to have friends over?” he asks, disbelief leaking into his words. 

El shrugs and sits down across from him. “Her parents don’t need to know,” she says, as nonchalantly as if she was proposing an idea about what to eat for dinner or making a remark regarding the weather. 

Jim gawks at her, his jaw all but literally unhinging from his face and dropping to the floor. His mind flares up in a chorus of alarm bells that ring belligerently in his ears.  _ How, in the name of all things holy, how did he, the chief of police, manage to raise such an unlawful, chaotic monstrosity of a child? _

“Absolutely not,” he says abjectly, forgetting all about tactics and strategies and discarding the well-understood fact that living with a teenager is a constant uphill battle of one-upmanship, wherein revealing any tiny vulnerability can set you at a permanent disadvantage and down the path to a pitiable loss. 

El frowns at him, the snake. Looks up and furrows her little eyebrows in confusion and upsetness. The goddamn  _ nerve _ of her. 

“Why?” she asks petulantly, and Jim wants to  _ scream.  _ He wants to scream, because  _ that’s not how you deal with something that inconveniences you! For the love of god, you can’t just break every rule you don’t like and lie to everyone in your way!  _

(But, then again. Admonishing her about something like that would be mighty hypocritical of him, wouldn’t it? After all, he  _ was _ a teenager once. He’s not  _ stupid.  _ He knows what’s going on in that brilliant brain of hers--at least to an extent. 

_ Of course  _ he knows what she’s thinking. He’s been there. Hell, he’s been there  _ and then some.  _ He remembers being sixteen and sneaking out of the house in the dead of the night to go smoke with his buddies. He remembers lying to his parents with the most unconvincing narratives ever fathomable, like  _ “No, Mom. Of course that’s not my sheet of LSD. I’m holding it for a friend.”  _ He remembers crashing parties he wasn’t invited to and crashing couches that weren’t his when he was too wasted to see straight or think anything other than  _ there’s no way I can let my dad see me like this.  _ He remembers getting absolutely shitfaced, drinking himself to oblivion and beyond, after his first heartbreak. He remembers breaking curfew and staying out past midnight and deliberately ignoring calls from his parents.

In fact, come to think of it, Jane might actually be a helluva lot better a kid than he was. A kid who follows the rules unless she finds a good reason not to. A kid who respects anyone that respects her.

A kid who deserves to see her friends, because for the vast majority of her life, she didn’t even have any.)

Hopper sighs, knowing he’s been defeated, and resigns himself to an ailing slouch as he picks himself up and grabs his car keys off the counter.

“Come on, kid,” he says, opening the door to the crisp, cool December air outside. Jane fixes him with a confused stare, but grabs her jacket and gets up from her seat at the table.

“Where are we going?” she asks, peeking out at Hopper’s truck before stepping onto the balcony, shivering as she tugs her overcoat tightly around herself.

Jim grimaces, carding his fingers through his hair and taking a step onto the frostbitten earth in front of the woods surrounding the house, his boots crunching in the thin layer of snow that the holiday season has had to offer them. He makes his way to the truck, El never more than a few steps behind him, and turns around to face her only once he’s reached inside and started the ignition, giving the worn vehicle a moment to thaw out and defrost.

“We’re gonna go break that sonuvabitch friend of yours outta her house.” 

 

|~~~|

 

This is a terrible,  _ terrible  _ idea. One of the worst he’s ever had. 

Jonathan’s not a very confrontational person. When he was in third grade and this kid named Paul Anderson took his lunch money, he didn’t do anything about it. Didn’t even go to the teacher, or his mom; just opted to sit, lunchless, in the cafeteria, and starve for a day. When he was in junior high, and the younger kids first started picking on his little brother, his advice to him was to lay low and stay silent, because any sort of reaction would just provoke them further. In fact, less than two years ago, when Steve Harrington and his old buddies broke his  _ personal fucking property,  _ all he did was gripe about it in private, sulking to himself and wallowing in a vat of useless self-pity. 

So he can hardly understand what it is that’s compelled him to come here today, to show up at Steve’s door, unsolicited, and demand answers for the night before.

_ (Ideally, Jonathan would love to say that it’s because he wants to know exactly what Steve was doing driving around  _ his  _ girlfriend’s house without any rhyme or reason, and, if anyone finds out about his little outing this morning, that’s what he’ll say to justify it--but that’s not really what this is, is it?  _

_ No, Jonathan’s not jealous or angry or any of those things that he, as Nancy’s boyfriend, probably ought to feel in regards to his girl’s ex loitering around her house inexplicably. What he really is is confused. Confused and conflicted, and, though he hates to admit it: _

_ Looking for an excuse to visit Steve.  _

_ Which, now that he thinks about it, is pretty stupid. Why would he need a  _ reason  _ to see Steve? They’re friends, right? Friends don’t need a clearly defined purpose just to hang out with each other. And sure, they don’t exactly interact all that much without Nancy there, but that shouldn’t a condition be so much as it is a coincidence, right? Jonathan  _ likes  _ Steve, as a person, in spite of all the rules that dictate that he shouldn’t. He’s a good guy. And he’d like to think that Steve likes him, too.) _

Thinking about it, Jonathan realizes that this course of action is even dumber than he initially thought it to be, and wholly unnecessary. He doesn’t need to go banging on people’s doors at 5 in the morning because he’s got a question; he could literally just call him, or invite him over, or do any of those perfectly reasonable, normal,  _ human  _ things people do when they wanna ask somebody something.

It’s way too early, and way too cold, for Jonathan to be out here like this. Steve’s probably not even  _ up  _ yet. 

Making up his mind with minimal embarrassment, Jonathan decides to go home before anyone sees him standing creepily outside the Harrington household at the asscrack of dawn. He turns himself around, and is about to start the trek back to his own place, when--

_ “Byers?” _

Jonathan swivels on the ice-decked pavement, and there, standing in the wake of his previously closed front door, is a disheveled, groggy looking Steve Harrington with mussed-up hair flying every which way, half lidded eyes and a bit of drool staining his chin, and wearing nothing but pajama bottoms and a hastily pulled-on bathrobe. He looks at his uninvited guest, bewildered, and for a painstakingly silent second, Jonathan just stands there, mouth agape, staring at the just-out-of-bed version of his friend that he’s pretty sure no one was ever supposed to see, least of all  _ him _ . 

Steve narrows his eyes and smacks his dry lips, rubbing some of the sleep from his face with the palm of his hand. 

“What the  _ hell  _ are you doing here?” he asks, and Jonathan snaps out of the weird trance he’s found himself in, “It’s, like, buttfuck early in the morning, dude.”

Jonathan opens his mouth to respond, to provide some sort of half-assed explanation for his being here, but no words come out. 

Instead, he takes an unconscious step forward, not altogether sure what the fuck it is he’s thinking, and, in doing so, steps wrong on his bad foot.

The icy floor goes out from underneath him, and he only has a split second to watch the expression on Steve’s face change from befuddlement to wide-eyed panic before he feels himself falling backwards, arms flailing and legs twisting, all to no avail as he sees the sky in his peripheral vision and catapults backwards into the air.

_ Shit.  _

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Orchee? Finally entering a linear plotline??? I guess miracles DO happen.

**Author's Note:**

> Comment, you cowards!! Tell me it sucks!!!
> 
>  
> 
> (Pls?)


End file.
